Harben Kay Quartet | Chris Amer Sextet

Saturday 25 July, 9-11pm
George Square Gardens Piccolo

A double bill featuring two of the most exciting and individualistic voices in Scottish jazz.

Saxophonist Harben Kay creates thoughtful compositions that are emotionally resonant. With their long-term band, they create a sound that is both globally influenced and unmistakably their own. Their intelligent writing is both intensely personal and thoughtful and is beautifully complemented by their liquid tenor tone and the empathy they share with their band of Peter Johnstone (piano), Calum Gourlay (bass), and Alyn Cosker (drums). Their assured performances merge contemporary ideas  with conventional jazz virtues creating a sound that is both globally influenced, with Scottish inflections and unmistakably their own.

Opening the concert, guitarist Chris Amer’s music is strongly melodic, with elegant improvisations and chorale-like orchestrations. He treads his own path influenced by poets like Norman MacCaig, the Scottish landscape, and straddling the ever-blurring boundary between jazz and traditional Scottish music. For his EJBF debut he is joined by Ali Watson (bass), Fergus McCreadie (piano), Matt Carmichael (saxophone) and Stephen Henderson (drums).

"There's a beguiling flow to Amer's music, the bright strings of tenor guitar laced with licks and murmurs of round-toned electric, that defies pigeonholing.” The Scotsman