Elijah Jeffery & Eddie Gripper Duo, Black Mountain Jazz, Melville Centre for the Arts, Abergavenny, 25/01/2026.

Elijah Jeffery – vocals, Eddie Gripper – piano

A welcome return to the Melville Centre for two of Black Mountain Jazz’s favourite sons, vocalist Elijah Jeffery and pianist Eddie Gripper.

Oxfordshire born Gripper was a founding member of the Club’s house band, the BMJ Collective, and has since established a successful career as the leader of his own trio, releasing his acclaimed debut album“ Home” in early 2023. Review here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/eddie-gripper-home

Praised by the national jazz media “Home” put Gripper firmly on the UK jazz map and he has since toured the music widely, whilst remaining true to his roots as graduate of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD) in Cardiff, the city in which he is still based.

Since leaving the BMJ Collective Gripper has returned to perform in Abergavenny with his trio and also as the co-leader of a quartet featuring saxophonist Alex Clarke, a musical relationship that was first forged at a BMJ Collective gig. All of these performances are reviewed elsewhere on this site, as are performances by the Gripper Trio in Worcester and Kidderminster. Gripper has also performed in Abergavenny and Brecon with vocalist Debs Hancock.

The enterprising Gripper has also run a regular weekly session at the Suffolk Arms pub in Cheltenham with the house trio regularly joined by leading guest soloists, some of them coming up from London to play. In May 2025 I enjoyed a performance there when Gripper was joined by saxophonist Dom Franks, a Cheltenham based musician with a national reputation. This was at the time of Cheltenham Jazz Festival but did not form part of the official programme. More recently Gripper has been hosting events at the Merryfellow in the Cheltenham district of Charlton Kings. His full gig diary can be found here;
https://edgripper.wordpress.com/live-and-touring/

Gripper is due to release his second trio album “Americana”, the music inspired by a hitch hiking trip to the West Coast of Canada and the US,  later in 2026 and once again he will be touring the album extensively. The release of the album and the accompanying tour dates will be very keenly anticipated.

Originally from Hampshire Jeffery is a graduate of the RWCMD and like Gripper has elected to remain in the Welsh capital. My first sighting of him was as part of an online performance by the Cardiff based big band Siglo Section that formed part of the 2020 ‘Virtual’ Brecon Jazz Festival. Jeffery was featured as a guest vocalist and acquitted himself well as he sang a Nelson Riddle arrangement of the Cole Porter song “Night and Day”. My account of the performance can be found as part of my Festival coverage here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/friday-at-virtual-brecon-jazz-festival-07-08-2020

In 2023 he played Brecon Jazz Festival for real, appearing as part of the Cardiff jazz, funk and soul ensemble Funkyard, a band taking the mighty Tower Of Power as their primary source of inspiration. In addition to being one of three featured vocalists, alongside Sylvie Noble and Amy Marsden, Jeffery also played guitar with this group. My account of this performance, which formed part of BJF’s Family Jazz & Dance Day can be found here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/brecon-jazz-festival-jazz-at-the-marquee-family-jazz-dance-day-brecon-county-showground-brecon-06-08-2023

As a jazz vocalist Jeffery cites Mel Torme. Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Kurt Elling as primary sources of inspiration. He also writes and performs his own material and in 2023 released the five track EP “One of Her Clowns”. Among those contributing to the recording was Gripper, with whom Jeffery has formed a successful songwriting partnership, culminating in the release of the duo’s eponymous debut album in the summer of 2025.

Another project with which Jeffery is involved is A Wheel Inside A Wheel, a jazz flavoured folk / Americana collaboration featuring fellow vocalist Sylvie Noble. Jeffery both sings and plays guitar with this quartet, which also features bassist Ursula Harrison and saxophonist Coren Sithers. Jeffery has also worked with the Irish pianist Nils Kavanagh, a former Young Irish Jazz Musician of the Year award winner.

In August 2024 Jeffery appeared at BMJ as the leader of a quartet featuring Gripper on piano together with bassist Nick Kcal and drummer Patrick Barrett-Donlon. This was a show that was a triumph for the vocalist and my account of that performance can be read here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/elijah-jeffery-quartet-black-mountain-jazz-melville-centre-abergavenny-25-08-2024

More recently (November 2025) Jeffery returned to BMJ as a guest vocalist with the RWCMD Big Band in an evening billed as “A Tribute to Quincy Jones”. This was a totally sold out performance that represented another triumph for the singer and also for BMJ. Review here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/rwcmd-big-band-a-tribute-to-quincy-jones-black-mountain-jazz-melville-centre-abergavenny-30-11-2025

Gripper and Jeffery released their eponymous debut album in June 2025 and during the same month I saw them give a duo performance at the Smokey Joe’s venue in Cheltenham. There had been some kind of mix up over the dates and the show was sparsely attended, although it was good to spot Dom Franks among the audience. Despite the poor turn out this was an intimate and enjoyable performance that featured all eight songs from the album plus a mix of well chosen jazz standards and an imaginative and eclectic selection of pop and rock covers. I didn’t cover the show but I did review the album. My review of the recording can be found here;

I’m pleased to report that tonight’s event drew a far more substantial crowd, not a total sell out, but a very respectable attendance nevertheless. The performance was broadly similar to that at Cheltenham, still centred around the album and the duo’s original songs but with a lot of interesting new ‘outside’ material having been brought into the set.

The sharply dressed duo, smartly suited and booted, eased the audience in with “I’m Old Fashioned”,  a much loved standard from the ‘Great American Songbook’. The line “the sound of rain upon a window pain” sounded all too appropriate given the awful January weather that we’ve been experiencing recently. As with most of the performances tonight Jeffery’s polished and well enunciated singing of the verses was augmented by a passage of fluent piano soloing from the excellent Gripper.

With regard to the album Jeffery and Gripper set themselves the target of writing and recording the music within eight weeks, with each working around their other commitments. A period of intense songwriting activity followed and the quality of the songs that the duo came with up is quite remarkable, all of them demonstrating genuine musical and lyrical intelligence.

The first of the original songs to be performed was the ironically titled “Good Honest Men”. Jeffery may have a warm vocal style but that doesn’t prevent the duo from exploring darker, sometimes overtly political subject matter. Inspired by the 2024 elections in the UK and elsewhere this song addresses the duplicity of politicians, albeit without naming any directly, while acknowledging the theatricality of the campaigning process. It’s one of those songs (often the best kind in my experience) that revels in the contrast between a sweet melody and an acerbic lyric.

Similar qualities inform “True Love Never Dies”, the duo’s attempt to write a folk inspired murder ballad.   Written in the third person it charts the story of the murder by a young woman of her former lover, a neat contemporary twist on the form – “just a small flash of silver, and the screams could be heard through the night”. Interestingly this was the only song from the album that had been performed by the Jeffery Quartet at that BMJ performance in August ‘24.

“This is a song about London” said Jeffery by way of announcing a return to the standards repertoire and a performance of the George and Ira Gershwin song “A Foggy Day in London Town”, complete with its attention grabbing ‘Westminster Chimes’ piano motifs.

Announcing duties were shared equally between the pair and Gripper explained that he had been introduced to the Joe Jackson song “It’s Different For Girls” by his mother. The duo members weren’t even born when the song was first released in 1978, which suddenly made your reviewer, who remembers it well, feel very old. Nevertheless I loved the duo’s slowed down, minor key re-imagining of the song as they very much made it their own, while simultaneously providing a welcome reminder of Jackson’s talents as a songwriter.

From the duo’s album “Close Your Eyes” was the first original song that the pair wrote together and was a commission from the Songs for Well Being project. As its title suggests it addresses the subject of sleep but also serves as a compelling account of unrequited love.

With their shows the duo seek to showcase not only their own songs but also the music that influenced and inspired them. Influential for both the singer and the pianist are the albums recorded by vocalist Tony Bennett and pianist Bill Evans. From the second of these, 1976’s “Together Again” came “Lucky To Me”, song written by Leonard Bernstein with lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. This was another convincing interpretation from this talented duo.

If Bennett and Evans represent predictable influences for a voice and piano duo the combination of singer / songwriter / guitarist James Taylor and keyboard player and multi-instrumentalist Larry Goldings, the latter best known as a jazz organist, is definitely more left field.  The pair toured together with Taylor describing the versatile Goldings as his “One Man Band”. Taylor’s song “The Frozen Man” is sung from the point of view of a man lost during the course of Franklin’s unsuccessful mission to discover the North West Passage and frozen in the ice for over a century before being brought back to life by modern medical technology. See what I mean by ‘eclectic’. I’m not a huge Taylor fan but in its own way this song, with its unusual subject matter, ranks right up there with his best work. Jeffery and Gripper more than did it justice with an accurate and emotive rendition.

A lengthy first set concluded with “Swan Song”, the final track on the duo’s album. It was the last piece to be composed for the project and was literally written on the evening before the recording session. The title was inspired by the swan depicted on the album cover, which was photographed in Cardiff’s Bute Park prior to the recording session. The duo have described this piece as ‘an epic’, a shifting opus that here passed through several different phases and embraced a variety of moods and styles, from power ballad to lament.

Set two commenced with a song new to the repertoire of the duo. This was another piece that reflected their love for contemporary American songwriters, in this case Rufus Wainwright, whose song “Poses” was praised by Gripper as being “wonderful and theatrical”. Like the James Taylor song in the first set it wasn’t a work that I was previously familiar with but it was certainly a great song, and one that was given a great performance by this duo. I’d like to say thank you to Elijah and Eddie for introducing me to both the Taylor and the Wainwright songs and it begs the question would a covers album be a viable idea for these two?. They are certainly superb interpreters of the songs of others as well as being excellent songwriters in their own right.

The original song “Because of You” was written as a homage to the ‘Great American Songbook’ and represents the duo’s attempt to write a song in that style, particularly in terms of both lyrics and harmonics.  On the evidence of tonight’s performance they have succeeded brilliantly. This was a song that very much had the feeling of a jazz standard.

In addition to their love of classic American music from various eras the duo also share a love of traditional English folk music. From the folk canon came the traditional song “I Live Not Where I Love”, the duo’s interpretation inspired by a recording by the celebrated folk-rock group Steeleye Span featuring the vocals of Maddy Prior. Gripper cited the timelessness of the lovelorn lyrics as the duo gave yet another compelling adaptation. Whatever the source their song selections are always right on the mark.

Gripper spoke of his love for folk inspired songwriters such as Taylor, Joni Mitchell, and his own personal favourite Paul Simon. The as yet unrecorded “Shifting Seasons”, a Gripper solo composition drew inspiration from Simon’s methods and represented a convincing homage to his songwriting hero.

Jeffery is also a trained actor and the duo’s original song “Love is a Game” was developed from the kernel of an idea from one of Jeffery’s actor friends. A song about a failed romantic relationship, it’s refrain “Love is a Game We Couldn’t Win” suggested that it might be a distant cousin to Amy Winehouse’s “Love is a Losing Game”.

From the first Tony Bennett / Bill Evans album came “Waltz For Debby”, arguably Evans’ most famous composition. Written for the pianist’s young niece it’s a piece that I’ve heard performed as an instrumental on countless occasions. Tonight’s vocal version included lyrics written for Bennett by Gene Lees and addressed to the young girl of the title, and the fact that she will inevitably grow up. Although sympathetically treated by the duo it’s always a tune that I’m going to prefer in its instrumental format.

The only non original piece on the album is a version of Henry Purcell’s “Dido’s Lament”,  the closing aria from his opera “Dido and Aeneas”.  It’s a song that deals with dark and disturbing subject matter and was sung by Jeffery with a profound sense of involvement, in an emotive performance that also demonstrated the breadth of this technically gifted singer’s vocal range.

The inclusion of the Purcell piece offered further evidence of the duo’s breadth of influences. These also include musical theatre (Jeffery’s acting training again) and tonight’s performance concluded with Stephen Sondheim’s “Send In The Clowns”, a song with many theatrical references. I’ll be honest I’ve always found it both mawkish and pretentious but tonight’s interpretation was better than most and such a well known song was always going to get a great reaction from the audience.

The inevitable encore was a playful rendition of “Walking My Baby Back Home”, a song that has been in Jeffery’s repertoire for quite some time.

Presented with wit and warmth by the two musicians this was a superb duo performance that combined excellent vocal and instrumental skills with quality original songwriting allied to the imaginative interpreting of a well chosen selection of outside material, this ranging from the well known to the obscure and fascinating.

My fellow scribe and occasional Jazzmann contributor Nigel Jarrett was very impressed and compared Jeffery’s performance to the great Kurt Elling, which is praise indeed. As regular readers of this site will know I’m not always a huge fan of vocal jazz, and particularly male singers, but I do appreciate quality when it comes along – and Elijah Jeffery is quality. These are musicians who are gradually developing a following, but the scale of their talent suggests that they have the potential to become even better known than they already are. We were very lucky to catch up with them in such an intimate and acoustically perfect performance space as the Melville Centre.

In addition to being supremely talented musicians Gripper and Jeffery are also genuinely nice guys and wonderful human beings and as always it was a pleasure to talk with them during the interval and after the show.

Thanks for a great performance tonight guys. Now I’m looking forward to hearing Eddie’s new album “Americana”.

 

 

 

 

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