01 Feb In The Mix With Soweto Kinch @ Rich Mix, LDN (Review)

There’s a whiff of misleading advertising where the new Soweto Kinch weekend residency at the Rich Mix bar is concerned. It turns out, as I discovered on attending the inaugural show last Sunday, that Kinch himself only curates the event. He doesn’t actually play every week and will be merely making cameo appearances once a month. In the meantime we have various members of Soweto’s band and past collaborators to keep us company. As you would expect the standard is high; particularly appealing when you consider that entry is completely free. First out of the hatch for the premiere gig was Barbados-raised clarinet/saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings, with Neil Charles on double bass and Seb Roachford on drums. The adorably bashful Hutchings is an accomplished bandleader himself and regularly tours with his own consortium of high calibre musicians, ‘Zed-U’.