You are in the Special Features section - Naomi Payne, singer and entertainer

Naomi Payne, jazz and blues singer and entertainer and forties/WWII entertainer based in Shropshire. Naomi also covers from 1920s - 1940s gangster and moll parties, murder mystery, tea dances, vintage balls.

Here, Digger talks to Naomi Payne, singer and entertainer, who specialises in jazz and blues and who has wowed audiences at vintage events and private parties. As a solo artist or with her four-piece or sixteen-piece bands, Naomi comes with a grounding in the material of the greats of jazz and blues like Ella Fitzgerald, Bessie Smith, Leadbelly and Billie Holiday. This pedigree manifests itself in her performances.

Naomi Payne is available to perform in Shropshire, Staffordshire, Cheshire, Hereford, Wales, Birmingham and the midlands and further afield by arrangement.

Digger: Hello Naomi.

Naomi: Hello Digger!

Digger: You sound very happy and upbeat as usual. Are you ever grumpy?

Naomi: (Laughs) Yes at about 10:00 in the morning.

Digger: So you're like me and need a few coffees first? My girlfriend is like the woman in the old Ski yoghurt TV ads. You know, she jumps out of bed and flings the curtains and windows open with a big smile. Nothing like me!

Naomi: Yes, I remember that. (Both laugh) That's not me either.

Digger: Please tell us a bit about your musical background and your musical inspirations.

Naomi: I suppose it was my parents, who are both into the folk scene, who influenced me. I was brought up on folk music and was encouraged to sing from an early age at folk clubs, parties and that sort of thing. My parents used to have people round with guitars and accordions. They would get me to learn songs and to stand up and sing them.

Digger: Doing your party piece? That could have gone one of two ways, either you'd go with it or you'd rebel as a child and a teenager.

Naomi: Yes, it's funny isn't it? I don't remember ever feeling particularly nervous about it. I did enjoy it, whereas my two girls who would now be at the sort of age where I was doing that sort of thing aren't keen on doing that at all.

Digger: Ah!

Naomi: But they both play piano and would gladly play a piano piece.

Digger: That's good.

Naomi: But they wouldn't ever get up and sing.

Digger: I think that's wonderful that they play and it would be nice if everybody could learn an instrument.

Naomi: I think so too. I would have loved to have learned an instrument. It's so expensive, though, isn't it? When the bill comes through for theirs I think "Oh my God!" (Laughs)

Digger: It could be worse, it could be ponies.

Naomi: Absolutely. So as a child I learned to play a flute. But when I got to about fourteen I didn't want to carry on with that. (Laughs)

Digger: A very handy sized instrument though.

Naomi: Exactly. I learned quite a few chords on the guitar, because my Mum had quite a good collection of blues LPs which I'd rummage through. People like Gerry Lockran, who is fabulous and I used to listen to him all the time. Have a listen to him on YouTube - an album called Blues Vendetta - he is brilliant. In fact I've got it on cassette, not on LP. He has a fabulous voice and I'm always drawn to that sort of blues style - John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, Elmore James, Bessie Smith, Lil Green and those sorts of people. So I was singing and playing a few chords of blues and then I met up with a piano player in my later teens who suggested I join him as a duo. We performed at restaurants and hotels, which meant jazz-style, so I went down that route because that's where the gigs were. I did people like Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald and Lena Horne, although I still prefer the raw side of things. Ella is a jazz icon and great but I find it a little too perfect.

Digger: I know what you mean.

Naomi: I've always listened to people like The Inkspots and so on.

Digger: Were you not also into the contemporary stuff that your friends would have been into?

Naomi: No. It's funny a few months ago I bumped into somebody who I knew from school and she said "Oh yes, you were a bit odd, weren't you?! Because you liked jazz." (Both laugh) I thought "Hang on!" I was one of the kids who would hang around with others who played instruments and the others were listening to Bros. Mind you, I used to like Terence Trent D'Arby.

Digger: (Sings song) "Sign your name across my heart.."

Naomi: Yes, that's the one. I listened to people with more unusual voices I have to say. I was lucky enough to have parents and grandparents with a large 78s collection of twenties and thirties stuff - Paul Robeson and that kind of thing.

Digger: We have a client called 78RPM DJs who does shows based on the vintage 78s. Have you heard of him?

Naomi: No.

Digger: He might be worth getting in touch with. So this passion for vintage was down to your Mum?

Naomi: I think so. Her blues collection and my Grandfather's huge 78s collection - Johnnie Marvin, Jay Wilbur...

Digger: You do pretty well on remembering the names.

Naomi: (Laughs) You know, that sort of thirties sound?

Digger: I do and I love that and the rawness you mentioned as well. I suppose you're like me - not having a problem with the scratches and the bumps on these old records?

Naomi: No, and in fact at my gigs I usually plug an iPod in through my PA system with thirties and forties songs on there. But I also have one of those wind-up gramophones and take the 78s along with me. It does men winding it up all the time though.

Digger: Who are your typical audiences and customers Naomi? And what sort of feedback do you get?

Naomi: I don't have a stereotypical customer. I have jazz gigs where people sit and listen and then I have the vintage-style gigs with my Hotsy Totsy Band where people get up and dance and then I have the gigs where I play at fashion shows. I've got one in February where I've got to play at an 007 Casino Evening. I get a lot of repeat bookings - I do a lot for a charity called Hope House and the lady there organised this casino evening and said could I come and perform there as a quartet. "Is there any chance you could sing a few James Bond numbers?" she said, so I learned a few specifically for it. That's also vintage as well now, isn't it?

Digger: It is. The first James Bond movie was '62.

Naomi: So it's very retro. Goldfinger and You Only Live Twice, Diamonds Are Forever. I think there's about ten of them. I'll learn them and then I will throw them in occasionally on a jazz gig.

Digger: It adds to your repertoire. If people hear you doing something that's not what they'd expect you might get some other bookings from it.

Naomi: Yes.

Digger: You're very flexible aren't you? You're doing an eclectic variety of styles but also saying that you can turn up as in individual or a duo or a quartet . You have to do that these days I suppose?

Naomi: I don't go out on my own with just a backing track. People have asked me to do that, because times are hard and maybe they can't afford to splash out on a full band. But it's not something yet that I've gone down the road of doing. There's pros and cons of working with bands and singing to backings and I'm not sure if it's for me or not really. It's a case of "never say never really" isn't it?

Digger: And that takes us back to James Bond again! (Both laugh) So in an ideal world what's your favoured format and favoured genre?

Naomi: With the jazz, it's still vintage because it was popular in the thirties and forties and the ragtime era so I'm not going into any other genre really. I'm doing the same performance at each gig in reality. It's just that with the Hotsy Totsy gigs you're dressing up and it's a bit more theatrical and a bit more of a show rather than a jazz gig where you're going along in your everyday clothes.

Digger: Sometimes people are sitting down with their arms folded listening intently, sometimes they're going with the beat and dancing and having a rave-up and at other times you're just background music to what is basically a vintage fair. They're very different aren't they?

Naomi: Yes, I think it's probably the way it's advertised that effects people's behaviour. I think if you let people know that they can get up and dance then they will, but some people are self-conscious and not sure if it's the thing to do. At jazz gigs, you've got people foot-tapping along.

Digger: A little bit of alcohol helps me there.

Naomi: Not much of that at tea dances.

Digger: You can put a bit of sherry in there. What would you say are the reasons why retro and vintage are so popular? When I started it was a bit niche, but now...

Naomi: I suppose it has become much more popular. I've always been into it, because I've been drawn to the vintage radio and vintage objects and music obviously. But I suppose people look back at it with a bit of envy, I suppose. Because there did seem to be a lot more order and people seemed to be more happy with their lot rather than now where we all seem to be wanting a bit more. Everything seems to be a bit more chaotic and with The Internet everything's got quicker. I suppose we look back with rose-tinted glasses.

Digger: The wartime community are very obsessive about it but they seem to forget that people were dropping big lumps of explosives on us and we were losing loved ones as well, but they still say what a wonderful time it was. And in some ways I suppose it was.

Naomi: I think that has to be remembered and people who do look back and say "I wish we'd lived then" need to consider that. The films have a lot to do with it - the thirties and forties films with shiny hotels and dancing.

Digger: That's true and the funny thing is that most of those films were made as an escape for people, most of whom were in desperate circumstances when they left the cinema with the depression and the war and so on.

Naomi: Yes.

Digger: I can remember saying to a celebrity pen pal once that I'd love to go back to the days when people were more polite and they all wore smart clothes and she said "Oh no. All that illness that we have cured and people are much better off in so many ways these days." And she had a point.

Naomi: Fashions then - people did seem to be smarter. People made much more of an effort.

Digger: Working class people looked clean and smart, didn't they? And now we're all such slobs.

Naomi Payne at a forties vintage event

Naomi: Yes. Just like me now in my tracksuit.

Digger: I'm wearing jeans and a T-shirt today and that's typical for people of a certain age these days.

The sixteen-piece band