Manchester Jazz Festival: John Surman

Composer and multi-instrumentalist John Surman is a key figure in a generation of European jazz musicians who have crucially expanded the international horizons of jazz over the past 40 years or so. A stalwart of the ECM record label, he is currently at the height of his considerable powers, and long acknowledged as a world-class improviser and a composer of a body of work that extends far beyond the perceived boundaries of the jazz repertoire.

His unique solo performances reflect the special blend of acoustic and electronic music as featured on recordings such as The Road To St Ives. Mesmerising rhythmic patterns are set up as a landscape over which his improvisations gradually unfold, voiced through his lyrical soprano, the earthy ruggedness of the baritone, and an approach to the bass clarinet that captures both its mischief and its melancholy.