Fergus McCreadie meets Xhosa Cole, Edinburgh Jazz Festival review: 'unbridled intensity'
Renewing a musical acquaintance they first struck up a decade ago, Fergus McCreadie and Xhosa Cole performed an astonishing hour-long torrent of free improvisation, writes Jim Gilchrist
Fergus McCreadie Meets Xhosa Cole, St Bride’s Centre, Edinburgh ★★★★
Edinburgh’s Haymarket area on Friday night was seething with cowboy-hatted and booted crowds – and that was just the women – as fans primed themselves for country superstar Luke Combs’s concert at Murrayfield. Just ten minutes’ walk away, however, a somewhat lesser but every bit as anticipatory crowd was assembling, un-stetsoned, at the St Bride’s Centre for music of a different temperament but with an unbridled intensity of its own.
Having already appeared during this Jazz Festival in partnership with trumpeters Warren Vache and Mathias Eick respectively, acclaimed Scots pianist Fergus McCreadie was completing his trio of duo concerts with Birmingham-based former BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year, saxophonist Xhosa Cole. Both with distinct styles of their own and renewing a musical acquaintance they first struck up a decade ago, the two of them strolled affably on stage and launched into an astonishing, virtually unbroken, hour-long torrent of unrestrained free improvisation, much of it using Cole’s championing of the Thelonious Monk canon as a touchstone.
A swirl of Cole’s quicksilver tenor sax over stealthy piano chords and they were off, Cole’s staccato repeated phrases or fiery shrilling prompting muscular or brightly cascading responses from McCreadie, often reflecting the mercurial nature of Monk’s compositions with snatches of the likes of Ask Me Now, Pannonica or Round Midnight flitting through the mix.
Cole might discharge volleys of notes, McCreadie responding tentatively before scampering off on an excursion of his own, their take-no-prisoners approach sometimes leavened by brief, winsome deliberations, sax crooning dreamily, piano lyrical, before a fresh onrush. Had we possessed cowboy hats, we might just have doffed them.
The Scotsman’s arts newsletter is now sent twice a week - subscribe today
Enjoying the Arts & Culture journalism on scotsman.com? Make it easier to find by selecting us as a preferred Google source
Want the latest Scottish headlines sent directly to your phone? Sign up to our new WhatsApp channel here
Comments
Want to join the conversation? Please or to comment on this article.