Festival faces, from top left: Byron Wallen [Urszula Tarasiewicz], Joshua Redman [ZackSmith], Mornington Lockett, Trish Clowes [Monika S Jakubowska] and Nat Facey

THE big international jazz names and the larger venues are often what grab the headlines in the EFG London Jazz Festival, which runs November 10-19, but some of the more interesting acts are to be found in the smaller clubs and pubs. They are also a lot cheaper than the concert halls, yet the quality is always very high.

Tickets for all the gigs below can be found at https://efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk except where mentioned.

The EFG-LJF lands at the Parakeet in Kentish Town with, unusually, jazz on a Wednesday night. On November 15, pianist Joe Webb will be there with his trio. His playing is simply joyous, whether he is channelling Art Tatum, exploring Duke Ellington or – as he is here – playing his own new material. It’s impossible not to smile when Joe is at the keys, especially when he is paired with regular companions Will Sach on bass and Sam Jesson at the drum kit. Webb is also much in demand as a sideman – he is on Rob Luft’s album (see below). Look, Brad Mehldau rates him, which should be good enough for you.

On Monday 13th, also as part of the EFG-LJF, the Parakeet welcomes Tori Freestone, an excellent saxophonist, who combines jazz with folk (much of it from the Canary Islands, where she is based much of the time) and Brazilian influences. Excellent back-up from Dave Manington on bass and Tim Giles on drums who, I believe, tutored Femi Koleosi of the Mercury-winning monsters Ezra Collective.

Keeping it local, Camden’s Green Note also plays host to several EFG-LJF events. November 10 sees guitarist Harry Christelis heads up a quartet featuring Christos Stylianides (trumpet), Andrea Di Biase (double bass) and Dave Storey (drums), for an ECM-ish evening of sometime spacy, explorative jazz. The daring and ever-eclectic (anything and everything from Curtis Mayfield to Mozart might appear) Pigfoot play on the 14th, with support from in-demand drummer and electronics wizz Will Glaser. There’s a brace of first-rate sax players (James Allsop and George Crowley) on the 17th and bassist Ruth Goller’s formidable Skylla project lands on the 19th, calling at all stops from Bulgarian folk and free jazz, but far more involving and exhilarating than that might suggest. Cellist Midori Jaeger is in support, offering a similarly boundary-busting take on jazz and world music.

The Jazz Café in Parkway has a couple of heavy hitters – Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters on November 10 and 11 (minus Herbie, of course) and that drummer’s drummer Mark Guiiana (13th) – who has played with Brad Mehldau, Avishai Cohen and Meshell Ndegeocello among many others – alongside the less well-known, including BadBadNotGood protégé Jonah Yona (12th) who brings a mix of R’n’B, jazz and skewered pop.

Bobby McFerrin’s daughter MadisonMcFerrin headlines a show at Jazz Café on the 19th, skipping artfully through a mix of soul, jazz and electronica, breakbeat, trip-hop, often singing acapella. She is doing a fine job extending the family legacy into pastures new and bold.

In might be a way west, but the 606 Club over at Lots Road in Chelsea has a comprehensive programme for the EFG-LJF that covers most of the many facets of (mostly British) jazz. It includes a Peter King Memorial Sax Summit on the 11th, celebrating the life and post-bop music of one of our great jazzmen (and a doyen of model aeroplane makers everywhere) and featuring brass royalty Mornington Lockett, Tom Smith, Trish Clowes and Nat Facey, with the Will Barry Trio providing the rhythm section.

On the 15th at 606 Shez Raja brings his dynamic indo-jazz-funk into the club, with a copper-bottomed guest in Soweto Kinch on saxophone. On the 18th, trumpeter Byron Wallen focuses on the more avant side of jazz, paying tribute to pianist and composer Andrew Hill, with whom Byron played. (The trumpeter also has a gig with his Four Corners outfit at the Vortex on November 16: it, too, has a splendid, wide-ranging LJF programme.)

There is a Sunday lunchtime concert at the 606 on the 12th by two organisations at the forefront of nurturing the jazz players of the future: World Heart Beat and the Julian Joseph Academy. They are presenting “Together We Go Forward”, a special gig featuring students from both programmes.

Julian Joseph [James Joseph Music Management]

With a seemingly endless parade of fresh jazz talent emerging weekly in this country, it is all too easy to overlook those who blazed earlier trails. Pianist Julian Joseph, the man behind the eponymous academy above, is one such figure – first Black British jazz musician to host a series of concerts at London’s Wigmore Hall, and the first to headline a late-night televised performance at the BBC Proms etc etc. He also hosts some editions of Radio 3’s J to Z and, lest we forget, he’s a damn fine player too.
As well as that 606 lunchtime gig with students, Julian is performing at the festival on November 11, playing the World Heart Beat Embassy Gardens at Nine Elms (an easy reach: Northern line direct from Camden). There he premieres his new work Kayryouacou – the original Carib name for Carriacou, the island in the West Indies where his father was born. The concerto will be performed by his regular jazz trio, with the addition of violinist Harriet Mackenzie (as featured by Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra Nova and the English Symphony Orchestra).

Julian appears to be moving into that overlap in a venn diagram between the spheres of jazz and classical music. On November 22 at the Royal Festival Hall, alongside the London Philharmonic Orchestra, he will play his own symphonic Spiritual Fiction or Fact? (No 5 of Symphonic Stories: The Great Exception) paired with his take on Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, featuring improvisations by the pianist. The programme is completed by social media’s favourite organist Anna Lapwood playing Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No3 in C minor on the RFH’s 7,866 pipes. This is not part of the LJF, so tickets from: https://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/whats-on/classical-music/julian-joseph-plays-gershwin

I recently discovered that Mick Herron, who writes the Slow Horses books (on Apple TV with Gary Oldman), is a fan of the austere and lyrical sound of the late Tomasz Stanko, in many ways the Godfather of Polish jazz. If he’s in town, Mick would definitely enjoy the tribute to the trumpeter at Café Jazz Posk (238-246 King Street, W6) on November 11, which features horn player Chris Batchelor, the excellent guitarist Rob Luft (check out his captivating and highly atmospheric new album, Dayab Days on Edition Records, which features Joe Webb and Byron Wallen, both mentioned above) and Alice Zawadzki on voice (an also on Luft’s record) and violin. Again, this is one of several gigs at the venue for the festival – check out the listings on the EFG-LJF website.

Back to the bigger boys and the Barbican. Joshua Redman’s new Blue Note album Where We Are – his debut for the label – has rarely strayed far from my turntable these past few weeks. It has taken several reviewers by surprise, for it is not, as you might expect of this fine improvising sax player, a “blowing” session, but a concept album of sorts. It’s a road-trip around America in song (although not in any geographical logic), lamenting and celebrating the USA in turn, and includes Streets of Philadelphia and By the Time I get to Phoenix as well as some more expected tunes, such as John Coltrane’s Alabama. An unusually varied mix, but it all works remarkably well, thanks to the deep, rich and expressive vocals of Gabrielle Cavassa, Redmond’s evocative and sometimes yearning sax, and astoundingly adept musicians – especially Brian Blade on drums and pianist Aaron Parks – and a scene-stealing guest in guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel. Redmond brings the record (not with the same band, but with singer Cavassa) to the Barbican on Sunday November 12.

If, however, you fancy something more “out there”, let me point you to the invigorating tenor player James Brandon Lewis who is at Café Oto with his quartet on the 19th. I saw him at the Vortex earlier this year, and it is visceral, muscular, yet melodic music, with superb levels of interplay between the musicians. Ayler, Coltrane, Sanders, Rollins are all in there, but brought bang up to date. It’ll be a great way to close out the festival.

• The EFG London Jazz Festival runs from November 10-19. Tickets and further details at: https://efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk