About this Event

Albert Ball’s Flying Aces was originally formed in 1916 by the aviators of 266 Squadron RFC. To relieve the stress and horror of their daily aerial dog-fights high above the trenches, they used to gather in the evenings to play then-popular music on whatever instruments they could find, naming themselves after a famous airman of the time. Having settled in Paris following the 1918 Armistice, they used their music and their wartime experiences to try to bring peace and understanding to a 1920s world, performing a wide repertoire ranging through naive 1910s pop songs, very early ragtime, the 'heroic age' of jazz and blues, French and German polkas and chansons, faux-exotic dance numbers and laments, Great War propaganda songs, music hall rabble-rousers and sentimental ballads - music which epitomises the spirit of that lost generation, resolutely jaunty and upbeat in the face of terrible loss and adversity.



(Our resident Albert Ball’s Flying Aces were actually formed in 2008 by Bristolian percussionist/vocalist Nicholas D. Ball, who conceived the novel idea of a band portraying a group of ex-RFC airmen performing authentic music themed around the Great War.)



"Authentic and upbeat jazz and ragtime band led by the charming Nicholas D. Ball who sings, drums and plays that most criminally underused instrument, the spoons.”

TimeOut