Brighton Alternative Jazz Festival

The inaugural festival was a showcase of deep jazz from around the world with a specific focus on female musicians. Woven Entity opened, a fun general clatter quartet featuring maracas, backing tracks, triangles, dog toys and much more, alongside a pure, warm saxophone tone from Julie Kjaer. The Sarah Gail Brand sextet were a more bombastic and looser entity with her trombone compositions a melodic blast and subtle, moving, elegant piano from Liam Noble. Friday night headliners Kiermyer-Birchall Transcension produced some sublime old school spiritual jazz with rich saxophone from work Birchall and expansive new compositions.

Mette Rasmussen’s plethora of different playing techniques (including removing the reed at one point) built to a fantastic loud crescendo, whereas Steve Noble’s intriguing all-over-the-place drumming provided the most ethereal moment of the festival when he beautifully underpinned muted sax with inner cymbal playing. The famous double bassist William Parker and drummer Hamid Drake from New York headlined Saturday night, joined by big fan saxophonist John Dikeman. There was a truly tangible chemistry and pure musicality about Parker and Drake, with magisterial shuffling drumming and both providing the standout solos of the weekend.

The more melodic, accessible parts of the festival were perfect to grab the attention of the uninitiated while the high quality of musicianship got jazz veterans excited too. It was a resounding success and a rare chance to see an exceptionally diverse range of talent; all for a cheap price too.

The Old Market, 11-12 September 2015

Rating: