Paul Edis (pno); Mick Shoulder (bs); Adam Sinclair (dms).
The Jazz Café had a fair smattering of punters in tonight. Some stayed, some left and there was much shifting around of seats before, eventually, we got our favourite pew 'twixt bar and piano.
In recent weeks, "The Caff" has seen no small percentage of the area's top pianomen in the spotlight. Collingwood, Gilligan, Glen, Harrison, Law and tonight Edis.
We are truly blessed in this neck of the woods to have so many magnificent manipulators of the well-tempered clavichord except this one tonight was a slightly ill-tempered Hyundai! If it was an Hyundai car it wouldn't have passed its MOT!
Paul Edis, to his credit, coped brilliantly and perhaps gave credence to the popularity of electric pianos and not just for the portability aspect.
However, that is by the by, the trio were magnificent. The locked hands block chord solo by Paul on Good Bait would surely have met the approval of the composer Tadd Dameron who I'm sure met up with far worse pianos in his days on the road. It was in Good Bait that I first noted the piano's quirkiness. Can Paul really be hitting a bum note every time on a number he must have played so often? then I realised it was to avoid the offending (was it c or c#? my ears aren't that good!) note.
There also seemed to be an occasional animal like sound emanating from the beast - at first I thought Paul was doing some Erroll Garner type grunting (Garner could have given lessons to Serena Williams on grunting!) but no, it was the piano.
Bossman Mike will no doubt be on the phone to a piano tuner (who does one phone now that Mick Danby's gone?) to prepare the instrument for its next opponent.
Having said all that, bum note or no bum note, this was a tremendous session with the trio firing on all cylinders and Edis at the top of his game - is he ever any less?
On drums, Adam Sinclair swung like the proverbial and his solo on Edis' Angular was certainly that!
Mick Shoulder rounded off this A list rhythm section. No histrionics, just sympathetic bass playing and meaningful melodic solos.
Lance.
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