ROB LUFT QUINTET AND ALEX HITCHCOCK QUARTET AT EDDINGTON 'S STOREY'S FIELD
Guitar Heaven Rob Luft
There is a frisson of pride when you see ‘your lad’ up there with the greats? Alex Hitchcock was a super talented friend of Cambridge Modern Jazz Club back in the day. Now their boy is hitting the highlights. Of course they saw it coming but it’s still a thrill to find you were right after all. Alex Hitchcock has been described by Jazzwise as’ the shape of jazz to come’. If that’s the case we are in safe hands with this inventive but relatable ( to use the mot du jour) player - he is young engaging and brings a winsome charm to the account of life as a jazz musician in 2019. How do you pay the rent? How do you serenade your beloved? What is romance in a cold and chilly techno world? Alex Hitchcock’s questions do get answered in a sequence of weirdly welcome and sometimes familiar tropes. “I love it’ cried one Italian jazz fan’ in the interval ‘it’s like an old fashioned jazz band’ Come again? Alex Hitchcock is groovy and original and yet she’s right, his work has the warmth and structure of jazz as we know it.and he is a fabulous saxophone player alongside all this new fangled creativity. His co-musicians who were flattened after a massive drive from Sheffield via South London, were right up to scratch. What about Will Barry? Is he the most modest super pianist of all time? He could take on any tune and make is unmissable. Can’t hurt having a piano as big as a small bus up there in the mega acoustics of Storey’s Field but he was heaven to listen to.. Fergus Ireland was sensational on bass and an energised and eclectic Shane Forbes dazzled with a dramatic drum set. Lovely compositions , great swing and super sounds.
With a reputation now climbing to stratospheric heights, Rob Luft’s career since his first album., has spread. like a miasma of golden mist across the jazz scene. “Riser’ made his name and collected critics’ stars across the board. Guitar is his central gift and for true aficionados of the art , Rob is stretching its potential to experimental levels boosted by a brilliant back rhythm combo of Joe Webb, Tom McCredie & Corrie Dick..Easy going and super affable Rob is a delightful stage presence. Were some of the numbers too much of a blast? Was the unique energy and skill of individual instruments lost rather than enhanced by their concert playing? I loved the more selective discriminating later pieces, Berlin has made it to Radio 3 deservedly as had their fabulous worth-coming -all-that-way-for finale/encore. Commerialism is not their thing but there is a fortune to be made in thinning out the sound for romantics and anyone who can’t take the pace of full on ferocity of focus. Just saying.
