Love Supreme Festival triumphs with Courtney Pine, Dave Holland, Gregory Porter and a whole lot of jazz

Early, steady drizzle this time showed it’s weatherproof, as the jazz and soul tribes mingled in celebratory mood, in numbers 50% up from last year.

Courtney Pine, a rare jazz presence on Sunday’s Main Stage, pulled out all his considerable crowd-pleasing stops, proving one of the weekend’s biggest draws under by now perfect summer sun. “If you know anything about jazz,” he preached in evangelist mode, “we’re about unity – especially the way the UK is going.” Pine’s Coltranesque soprano sax honks were just part of the party, proving jazz’s potential when powered by heart and talent this huge and open.

That’s true, too, of Gregory Porter, who headlined Sunday’s Big Top to a crowd spilling far outside it, and was treated as a pop star. A familiar set-list had fresh arrangements heavy on soul-powered brass punch, with Yosuke Sato’s blistering sax ensuring improvisatory potency. Porter, too, kept his artistic head above the growing industry clamour, remaining majestic on ‘1960 What?’, and reminding you how he’s vitally weaved gospel-soul earthiness and new popular songwriting back into jazz. Snarky Puppy’s British keyboardist Bill Lawrance mixed classical solos into their brew of fast latin funk shuffles, swaggering brass and singalong riffs on Saturday’s Main Stage. The Love Supreme ‘effect’ was at its most powerful when Phronesis were dumbfounded by roared encouragement to their airily spacious acoustic jazz, inspiring drummer Anton Eger to head-banging, hand-grenade pyrotechnics. Bassist Jasper Høiby asked for the cheers to stop so they could continue. “I’ve been waiting all my life to say that,” he sighed.

Christian McBride’s more straight-ahead bass-led piano trio benefited from a Big Top partly packed with curious post-Soul II Soul listeners, who approved every post-bop solo. Best of all was a section of the set by Dave Holland’s Prism, when the bassist’s oppressive, depth-bomb-heavy duet with drummer Eric Harland suddenly had the light let in by pianist Craig Taborn, who made the music breathe and swing, more than John Scofield, who followed Prism, as his Überjam band switched easily between jazz, electronica and rock’s pleasures, instead of fusing them. Such fleet-footed dances were second nature at Love Supreme.

– Nick Hasted  

 Read the full report with exclusive photos in the August issue of Jazzwise - in shops 24 July