RICHARD PARR A licensing law technicality has forced a thriving Norfolk jazz club to close. Dereham Jazz Society, which has been running for eight years and meeting for the past five years at the Aldiss Park premises of Dereham Football Club, is being closed with immediate effect.
RICHARD PARR
A licensing law technicality has forced a thriving Norfolk jazz club to close.
Dereham Jazz Society, which has been running for eight years and meeting for the past five years at the Aldiss Park premises of Dereham Football Club, is being closed with immediate effect.
The football club has learned from Breckland Council that it cannot allow another organisation, like the jazz club, to charge audiences for admission because it represents a contravention of its licence.
Club publicity officer Richard Nelson described the revelation as a “bombshell”.
He explained that the football club had applied for the wrong licence under new licensing laws which meant the jazz club would not be able to admit the public to its weekly sessions or use the bar.
Mr Nelson said the only way audiences could be admitted would be through joining the football club for a £12 membership fee. He said that would be “a nonsense”.
The club's officials are now looking for alternative premises to hold its Wednesday sessions.
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