I do like the look of Brian Blain’s Thursday evening gigs for May and June. They are at Lauderdale House in Highgate (above) Great acoustic, nice place for a summer night. The room is quite long and thin, so it’s worth getting there early. Blain is a very experienced promoter who knows the London scene as well as anyone.

The details are in Lauderdale House’s very, er, tasteful red-and-pink brochure
featuring the wonderful Tina May and an open-mouthed smile…

Here are the dates (start time 8.30pm, admission £9)

7th May Pete Churchill Trio (Steve Watts (b) and Dave Wickins(dr) ) with Bobby Wellins (tenor sax).
The unique Wellins tenor sound is uniquely memorable in this acoustic.

21st May Georgia Mancio (vocals) with John Pearce (p), Julie Walkington (b), Dave Ohm (dr)
Mancio drifts naturally into singing very well in both Italian and Portuguese.

28th May Dave Newton (p) with Andy Cleyndert (b) and Steve Brown (dr) )

4th June TOKYO SISTERS : Tina May (vocals) , Nikki Iles (p) – the regualr duo joined by Karen Sharp (saxes). (I confess to being baffled by the name of this very classy band from…..Kings Rangrey in Hertfordshire)

Drifting away from jazz I also would put a word in for cellist Frederique Legrand and her French programme on Sunday April 26th at 11.30am. Legrand is a super young cellist – I heard her absolutely shine in a conductorless Stravinsky Apollon Musagete. Legrand defies stuffy classical orthodoxy by appearing regularly in a band called Outside Royalty, and maybe the fact that she is rhythmically far stronger and assertive and less mousy than a lot of young cellists has something to do with that.