These Three UK Musicians Made the Most of Lockdown

The pandemic was absolutely devastating for jazz music and jazz musicians. Men and women who had dedicated their lives to mastering their craft had every opportunity to share it ripped away for almost two years, leaving them utterly bereft and at a loss for anything to do—that’s the accepted narrative, anyway. The reality is a little different, based on three interviews with three British-based jazz musicians. Admittedly, three is not a large sample size and, undoubtedly, there will be those who considered jacking it all in for a “proper job” as the financial pressures of the pandemic hit home. But chats with Martyn Roper (The Washboard Resonators), Elise Roth (and her Harvard Squares), and Steve Coombe (Shirt Tail Stompers) offered a curiously counterintuitive picture of what lockdown life for a pandemic might look like for a musician—how productive, relaxing and even enjoyable it might be. Martyn Roper, The Washboard Resonators Martyn, who is one half of the Yorkshire-based jazz and blues duo with Jack Amblin, called Britain’s on-again-off-again lockdown “sort of a dream come true in some ways.” The new dad was getting a bit sick of playing 200 or more one-nighter gigs a year. “I was perpetually tired and struggled at times to be motivated when home,” he said. But within