Bristol’s week in jazz, September 23-29

One of the country’s piano geniuses (who happens to live down the road) pays us a welcome visit, as does a radical foursome who first started shaking the UK jazz scene over twenty years ago. There’s Latin sounds from Switzerland, Afro grooves from Ashanti country and sundry weirdnesses from God knows where. Yes, it’s business as usual.

We probably see more of John Law than we’re entitled to hereabouts, what with him living down in Somerset. That shouldn’t mean we take him for granted, though – he’s acknowledged to be one of the finest jazz pianists in the country, with an improvisatory imagination that owes much to his devotion to the great Thelonious Monk. John Law’s Re-Creations (Be-Bop Club, Friday 27) is a delicious project that takes a very original look at well-known tunes and re-presents them as only he can, with very able assistance from saxophonist Sam Crockatt (another emigré to the South West). The band is promoting two new albums, including one of John’s always impressive solo work.

Another great quartet pitches up at the Bristol Old Vic, courtesy of promoter Ian Storrer’s highly successful programme in the Weston Studio. Launched in the early 90s Partisans (Sunday 29) put a jazz-rock firecracker under the UK jazz scene and the joint’s been jumping ever since. Their last album Swamp welded clever post-rock melodic ideas with insistent Hi-Life grooving courtesy of Thad Kelly’s tireless bass and Gene Calderazzo’s powerful drumming. Frontline players Phil Robson (guitar) and Julian Arguelles (saxophones) seemingly never run out of ideas and the whole band maintains a brilliantly coherent togetherness.

It’s a shame that the gig also coincides with some bona-fide Hi-Life from the music’s Ghanaian roots. Pat Thomas & Kwashibu Area Band (Jam Jar, Sunday 29) began their story in Kumasi, ancient capital of the Ashanti kingdom, before Pat Thomas Mensah took himself off first to Accra and thence, in 1982. to London. Since settling in the UK he’s added Latin influences to his percussion driven sound yet the cascading guitars and punchy brass retain their essential Ghanaian spirit. More Afro-Latin treats can be caught at the Future Inn when Swiss pianist Michael Fleiner brings his misleadingly named sextet Septeto Internacional (Thursday 26) to town. With Spanish, Cuban and Brazilian musicians in their ranks, Michael’s approach to composition takes the music into unconventional time signatures while still aiming to keep the dance floor busy.

Another musician who has earned his stripes working with dance grooves is saxophonist Craig Crofton. Craig’s back catalogue includes the fine and funky CCQ, spells with legend Pee Wee Ellis, the Dockside Latin Orchestra and the deeply bass-driven Dub From Atlantis. Currently you’ll catch him fronting ubercool ambient-dance/jazz outfit Phantom Ensemble, but his roots lie in modern jazz and the great John Coltrane so it’s good to see the Craig Crofton Quartet make an appearance (Fringe, Wednesday 25). As you’d expect it’s a groove-heavy outfit, with Hammond virtuosos John-paul Gard and jazz-rock guitarist Jerry Crozier-Cole joined by drummer Eddie John. You can also catch Craig alongside guitarist Adam Stokes at the Leftbank jam session (Tuesday 24).

There’s an intriguing collaboration at the Gallimaufry (Wednesday 25) when math-improv trio Waldo’s Gift welcome Brighton’s folk-jazzers Jouis for a collaborative session. Quite what the meeting will sound like is difficult to predict, though their combined musicianship should mean it will be pretty interesting. Possibly more challenging folk-jazz will feature  at the Exchange’s Schwet (Friday 27) evening when Bamya play their abstract fusion of post-rock and Greek traditional music. Think Captain Beefheart drenched in Ouzo … On the same night Cafe Kino hosts ‘pastoral-drone-folk-horror’ artist Saltings with EP/64’s Dan Johnson and Traumkl’s improvised electronic noise. And if that’s your thing then you surely mustn’t miss Dark Alchemy IV (Saturday 28, St Thomas the Martyr Church). It’s a ‘DARK NOISE & RITUAL AMBIENT FESTIVAL’ (sic) with acts from Bristol, Berlin, London and Manchester and, intriguingly, featuring a ‘miniature dark market’. It’s a fundraiser for the Churches Conservation Trust, apparently.

Things are even more ambitious, naturally, at The Cube when multi-media artists Partial Facsimile present Media OS 5.1 with guest musician Richard Norris. You can interact with that performance, which is based on an hour long journey commuting on the Tube, using smart phones but you’d probably be unwise to try interacting with Tapsew (Crofters, Wednesday 25). This remarkable duo offer a ‘high drama duet’ of tap dancing and sewing machine. They’re part of yet another unexpected night from The Sound Cupboard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN5-W6XpERo

And, finally, it’s good to welcome back the Bristol University Jazz, Funk and Soul Society for another year (Mr Wolf’s, Tuesday 24). The JFS nights at Mr Wolf’s have become legendary for the sheer enthusiasm of the crowds at their jam sessions which have been a nursery slope for many of the current Bristol scene’s burgeoning talents. If anyone doubts the talent or commitment of a younger generation to the legacy of jazz then a trip to JFS should certainly dispel those anxieties.