Joe Webb Quintet come out swinging at the 606

Friday night gigs at the 606 have long been the most relaxed of the week, and Joe Webb’s quintet set was no exception. His technique at the piano is dazzling in its inventiveness, speed, sensitivity and control of dynamics, but also in the way he references the keyboard saints of the swing and early bop era – particularly Art Tatum and Oscar Peterson. His deep knowledge of the classic jazz stylists was, after all, what made him the natural heir to the Kansas Smitty’s house piano stool.

Webb was joined on this occasion by Alex Harper on tenor, Will Arnold-Forster on guitar, Adam King on bass and his old mucker Shane Forbes on drums. The all-standards repertoire was familiar but varied, with a strong infusion of Ellington, although they began with ‘Moten Swing’, a tune closely associated with Count Basie. An up-tempo take on ‘You and the Night and the Music’, with well-chosen bebop licks from Harper, was followed by a piano-sax duet on the ballad ‘That’s All’, with a particularly fine and floaty extended coda. It was the sort of carefree, crowd-pleasing material that these young(ish) musicians learned when they were starting out but are now able to play with considerable freedom and finesse.

The first set’s closer ‘Cottontail’ featured Harper’s occasional knowing saxophone rasps, while there was more Ellingtonia in a somewhat parodic version of ‘Don’t Get Around Much Any More’, which put one in mind of the theme from Steptoe and Son. There were a couple of lesser-known numbers: the Harry Warren standard ‘I Wish I Knew’, and the final tune, Ellington’s ‘Take the Coltrane’. Just before that, Webb once again demonstrated his mastery of piano styles with an extended Fats Waller-type stride intro to Cole Porter’s ‘You Do Something to Me’.