DANCE, DON’T SWING
The We Out Here Festival—named for a 2018 double-album on the Brownswood label—presented musicians from the burgeoning UK jazz scene, one of the most vibrant, experimental, and popular jazz scenes to arise since early ’70s jazz fusion, or maybe since Dizzy Gillespie collaborated with Chano Pozo and created Latin jazz.
What is British jazz? Most obviously, it’s current jazz from Britain. Beyond that, it’s hard to define except to say that it combines traditional jazz elements with ethnic and cultural ingredients associated with British musical culture: African, Caribbean, and sometimes Indian influences, among others. It’s equal parts improvisational and elastic groove. The artists involved in the uprising explore, for example, spiritual jazz mixed with synthesizer sounds or brass arrangements fired by an Afrobeat pulse. Acoustic and electronic sounds blend with funk, African, and Caribbean rhythms. Soul and R&B vocals soar over jazz-funk beats with references to dancehall, calypso, soca, and highlife.
It’s hard to say who is part of the scene and who is not, but the WOH 2021 lineup1 included many of its leading musicians and groups: Nubya Garcia, Alfa Mist, Sarathy Korwar, Chiminyo, Ashley Henry, Ezra Collective, Moses Boyd, Matthew Halsall, Tenderlonious, Sons of Kemet, Joe Armon-Jones, Yussef Dayes, Emma-Jean Thackray. The festival also welcomed old-school beat DJs Kruder & Dorfmeister and James Lavelle, suggesting that while this style of jazz—rather, this cluster of styles—is mainstream in the UK, it hasn’t forgotten its roots.
“Joining the musical dots between soul, hip hop, house, afro, electronica, jazz and beyond, we showcase both outstanding live music and some of the best record collections in the world,” states the WOH Festival’s “About” page. That’s a decent description of current UK
