Review: Joe Temperley Quartet - The Byre Theatre, St Andrews

THE Fife Jazz Festival may only be five years old but the region has long featured on the jazz map – thanks, largely, to the fact that the leading baritone player in the world hails from Lochgelly.

Joe Temperley, the New York-based saxophonist in question, is not an infrequent visitor to Scotland, but a gig in his original stomping ground on the opening night of this festival was bound to be a special event and it certainly lived up to expectations.

Now in his 80s, Temperley still plays with an energy and force that belies his age. He let rip on a couple of fast blues, but it was on the slow and mid-tempo tunes that he made the strongest impression with a tone which is tender and authoritative.

Compositions by Ellington were the stand-outs of the evening. The saxophonist’s sensitive take on Sunset and the Mockingbird underlining his reverence for the Duke’s music.

That reverence was clearly shared by Dan Nimmer, the young pianist Temperley had brought with him from the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra. An elegant player with a crisp style, he set up Temperley’s exquisite version of Billy Strayhorn’s Lotus Blossom with a sublime rendering of Ellington’s Reflections in D, which revealed his own credentials as an Ellington disciple.

Rating: ****