Is jazz back from wherever it went? It’s been growing, not so slowly and not so quietly, at The Deck through the latter part of 2025, through a jam session hosted by (Dr) George Hess. LengPleng sat down with Dr George and owner of The Deck Thomas Moodie, to talk jazz and jamming.
George: We’ve been doing this now for six months, maybe seven.
Thomas: Probably a little bit longer.
George: Started in August or September.
Thomas: I think about September.
George: It’s growing. The last three weeks have been amazing. It’s just been packed. And it’s become a hot-spot, people are hanging around all night.
Thomas: Which I’m obviously pretty keen for. Having an environment where people can go into and be welcomed with open arms.
LP: And that’s always the spirit of a good jam session. Here it is, bring along what you have, let’s do something interesting together, the great thing about improvised music.
George: The difference between this and an open mic is that I basically play with everybody as their accompanist. And I started this out at Craft, David Totten brought me in, but it never really took off as a night. And then when Craft closed Thomas reached out to me and I brought the idea over here. It’s done really well right from the start, we’ve been getting more and more musicians to come.
LP: Originally it was fortnightly?
Thomas: We started out fortnightly.
LP: And then you added the workshop beforehand, and now it’s weekly.
George: I get three or four people to come each week for the workshop, and we go over a tune that we play later on in the jam session. Each week there’s at least one or two new people. I see over there there’s Alan, he’s a flute player with the Phnom Penh Symphony Orchestra, came last week for the first time for the workshop and he’s back again. So it’s becoming a place where people know they can come and find out about jazz.
LP: From the outside, watching it grow – having the workshop appears to take one of the hurdles out of the way. You can be part of the workshop and then make a decision later if you actually do something, either way there’s some tips on how to jam.
Thomas: And that’s how the workshop was pitched to me, of giving confidence, particularly to the locals, that perhaps have a great set of skills that they’re a bit afraid to share with others.
George: Teaching is what I’ve always done; I was a professor for 30 years. And my passion is to grow a jazz scene here, more than anything else. Like most of the barang here I’m retired, and this is my hobby and my passion.
LP: There’s an openness in Cambodia that’s quite unusual, if I can be excused editorialising. What interests me is that for some years “jazz” has been cocktail-style, standards, female vocalists – and there’s nothing wrong with that, but that’s a small portion of the jazz experience. Do you think there’s potential to actually grow a proper jazz culture – maybe not all original music, but at least playing things that aren’t just tunes that you can sing to?
George: Yes, as a matter of fact, we’re doing a jazz version of The Deck’s monthly Originals Sessions next month – featuring jazz composers, me and two others. All original music with a quintet. I’m trying to make sure that the music we play for the jam session is relatively accessible but not cocktail jazz.
LP: But at the same time not weird 70s funk fusion like On The Corner.
George: We do a few things that are a little funky, but not funk. We haven’t got to the extended jams yet, we’re still pretty structured, where people take a couple of choruses to solo.
Thomas: It’s just a few like-minded people really. It’s only a certain-sized town, doesn’t necessarily allow for as much as we’d like, but I think this is pretty exciting.
George: The one really nice thing about the Phnom Penh audience in general is they seem to be open to unusual things, things that you wouldn’t succeed with elsewhere. They often come out without pre-conceived notions of what it’s supposed to be.
LP: The Deck seems to be particularly open to: let’s try this, let’s try that, working around your restrictions around noise and time.
Thomas: You’ve got to think a little bit outside the box of what people think about music traditionally, that it’s loud and late. It doesn’t necessarily need to be that. And our crowd definitely supports the earlier stuff. We have good crowds come along on Saturday, and also the Thursday jam.
George: It’s open to the street, people walk by and come in. And we’re open to just about anything – someone came and read poetry over the band, that’s cool.
Thomas: And with Dr George hosting – many of us know that open mic type settings can get out of hand, but that’s not what we’re looking for here. We’re looking for something a little bit more controlled, support from professionals while you develop skills.
George: We have all levels or players – people just starting out, professionals. Because that’s how jazz always grew. Newcomers learn from the more advanced players, that is what’s supposed to happen. As Frank Zappa said: jazz isn’t dead, it just smells funny.
The jazz jam is held every Thursday at The Deck from 7.30 pm. The free workshop beforehand starts at 6.30 pm.
