Paul Edis & Graham Hardy, The Witham, Barnard Castle

A SMALL but enthusiastic audience for the launch of a new jazz series heard a wide ranging selection of music, much of it associated with some of the greatest jazz trumpeters.

Edis on piano and Hardy on trumpet opened with Brotherhood of Man, an affectionate tribute to Clark Terry who died only a few days earlier.

This and Miles Davis’s Freddy Freeloader helped warm us up for a particularly thoughtful version of I Loves You Porgy with Edis’s piano providing a wonderfully sensitive support for Hardy’s tightly muted trumpet.

A solo piano interlude provided more contrast with a lilting Greensleeves and an imaginative English Country Garden with versions of the melody overlapping each other.

After his breather, Hardy returned with his own composition, Boot the Blues, then a new version of My Funny Valentine and jazz classic Parisian Thoroughfare deconstructed and reassembled to great effect.

A second set brought McCoy Tyner’s Passion Flower with Hardy on flugelhorn and Duke Ellington’s Black and Tan Fantasy where he recreated Bubber Miley’s distinctive growl style.

In another contrasting piano set Edis played his own Vignette and the ever popular Bring Me Sunshine.

Duo performances included an unexpected You Talkin’ To Me and a delicate Taxi Driver as well as a Bach Two-part Invention before ending with an old Louis Armstrong success, La Vie en Rose.

The next in this series on Wednesday, March 25, is by the Zoe Gilby Quartet. Tickets from 01833 631107, details at thewitham.org.uk.

Peter Bevan