Ginger Baker’s Jazz Confusion

Before he was a rock god, the Cream drummer was an in-demand jazz session player. Returning to his roots with a quartet including funk sax legend Pee Wee Ellis, Baker performed a set comprised of bebop classics by Parker, Gillespie and Monk and scintillating Afro-Jazz originals, with Ellis’s upper register solos recalling a hypnotising snake charmer. Ghanaian percussionist Abass Dodoo was a revelation as he sparred with the leader, who made full use of every inch of his massive kit. A gentle take on Rollins’s ‘St Thomas’ was a tropical treat and closer ‘Groovin’ High’ received a deserved standing ovation.

The Old Market, 16 September 2012

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