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Driven to new heights by Henderson
By Robert Shore, Metro 18.09.06
Modern British jazz quartet created a bit of splash with their first performances at Ronnie Scott's
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As the son of a dancer at the Cotton Club, trumpeter Eddie Henderson got to rub shoulders with jazz greats from an early age.
Louis Armstrong gave him playing tips when he was just nine, and as a teenager studying at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music he had the chutzpah to tell Miles Davis: 'You don't play correct.'
It was an opinion Henderson later revised: his own atmospheric, spacey playing style is heavily influenced by Davis's early fusion work.
Henderson got his big break when he was invited to join Herbie Hancock's Mwandishi outfit. The crossover work they produced together didn't always please the purists but helped define the new intergalactic funk-rock direction taken by jazz in the early 1970s.
When Hancock broke up the band to form the hugely successful Headhunters, Henderson continued to explore the electronic avant-garde and even scored a dance hit - allegedly as a result of one of his recordings being played at the wrong speed by a DJ and mistaken for a disco number.
A trained doctor who over the years has combined medical and jazz careers, Henderson seems an ideal match for Ambulance, Arnie Somogyi's self-styled 'specialists in musical accident and insurgency'.
This modern British jazz quartet - consisting of bassist Somogyi, saxophonist Paul Booth, pianist Tim Lapthorn and drummer Dave Smith - created a bit of splash with their first performances at Ronnie Scott's. Henderson should drive them to new heights this week.
Tonight until Wed, Ronnie Scott's, 47 Frith Street W1, 9.45pm, £26 to £49. Tel: 020 7439 0747. www.ronniescotts.co.uk Tube: Tottenham Court Road
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