Nils Kavanagh Trio, Black Mountain Jazz, The Melville Centre for the Arts, Abergavenny, 26/04/2026.

Nils Kavanagh – piano, Ursula Harrison – double bass, Sam Green – drums, percussion

A near full house at the Melville Centre for this much anticipated performance from this young trio led by the Cardiff based pianist and composer Nils Kavanagh.

Of Irish and Danish heritage Kavanagh was born in Sligo, a hotbed of Irish jazz that hosts its own Jazz Festival and Summer School. He was first drawn to the music through the Sligo Jazz Project and was tutored by local jazz pianists Kieran Quinn and Mark Murphy. He later studied with Scott Flanigan, an Irish jazz pianist with an international reputation.

In 2022 Kavanagh won the inaugural Young Irish Jazz Musician of the Year Award. He subsequently moved to Cardiff to study Jazz Performance at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in Cardiff, where his piano tutors included Huw Warren and Elliot Galvin.

It was in Cardiff that he formed a trio with bassist Marcus Baber and drummer Sam Green. In 2023 the group undertook a six date tour of Ireland and recorded their debut album “No Expectations” in Limerick at the end of that tour. This represented an astonishingly mature debut and my review of the recording can be found here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/nils-kavanagh-no-expectations

Originally released in May 2025 “No Expectations” appears on Flaming Sword Records, a new independent imprint established by Kavanagh and two other Cardiff based musicians, bassist / vocalist Ursula Harrison and saxophonist Em Craig. In 2024 Kavanagh was a finalist in the 2024 BBC Young Jazz Musician competition, the actual award going to his friend, and now bandmate, Harrison. The other two finalists were trumpeter Klara Devlin and saxophonist George Johnstone and it’s interesting to note that all four finalists have been featured on The Jazzmann web pages over the course of the last year. This site has always maintained a strong commitment to supporting emerging British and Irish jazz talent.

Following graduation Kavanagh is still based in Cardiff and divides his time between the UK and Ireland. UK based musicians with whom he has worked include saxophonists Tony Kofi and Joe Northwood,  pianist / vocalist Liane Carroll and drummer / percussionist Paul Clarvis. He also leads an Irish piano trio featuring bassist Derek Whyte and drummer Miles Ronayne.

Cardiff based bands of which he is a member include The Mingus Project, the folk /  jazz ensemble A Wheel Inside A Wheel and drummer Sam Green’s Rivers and Lakes group, which is about to release its debut album.

I first saw Kavanagh perform as part of a duo with Cardiff based saxophonist Joe Northwood on the ‘Piano Trail’ at the 2025 edition of BMJ’s Wall2Wall Jazz Festival. This standards based set at the Bean & Bread Cafe saw Kavanagh playing an electric keyboard and my review of this performance can be found as part of my Festival coverage here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/sunday-at-wall2wall-jazz-festival-various-venues-abergavenny-28-09-2025

It was at the Wall2Wall show that Kavanagh provided me with a review copy of the excellent “No Expectations”, a recording that has also received national airplay on Soweto Kinch’s ‘Round Midnight programme for BBC Radio 3.

The quality of the “No Expectations”  recording had certainly whetted my appetite for seeing the Kavanagh Trio performing the music live. Since the recording Baber has been replaced in the bass chair on a permanent basis by BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year Ursula Harrison, who has learnt the music ‘by ear’ in an astonishingly short space of time. The Kavanagh Trio played tonight without the aid of sheet music, with improvisation and musical risk taking positively encouraged.
Tonight’s programme featured a mix of original material from the debut album, some of Kavanagh’s newer, as yet unrecorded compositions and a couple of remarkable interpretations of jazz standards, but more on those later.

With regard to the “No Expectations” album Kavanagh has said;
“The music on the record was inspired by one main question, what is like to ‘dwell’. Being Irish and Danish and having moved to Wales to study my personal idea of dwelling has come to the forefront of my mind in recent years. The album intends to capture different places and feelings that I would associate with home, be it the joy of a peaceful walk in beautiful Hazelwood, the mythical, dramatic landscape of Maeve’s cairn on Knocknarea mountain, or the bittersweet passage of time, inspired by my Danish grandmother’s clock, which still manages to chime every half hour after all these years”.

On his Bandcamp page the album is described as being;
“rooted in  Nils’ unique upbringing, the north-west of Ireland’s mystic landscapes and joyous fellowship, while also exploring the sense of unity and introspection present in Denmark and broader Scandinavia. Home, joy, family, mythology, folk music, loss and longing are all key themes of the album, with an overarching focus on warm melody and musical storytelling”.

The trio commenced with the album track “Hazelwood Home”, the composition that was featured on Kinch’s radio programme and which has also been issued as a single. The tune is named for a location in Co. Sligo that also acted as a source of inspiration for the poet W.B. Yeats. Ushered in by Harrison the piece was centred around her bass motif, this providing the bedrock for Kavanagh’s melodic piano improvisations, his playing gradually becoming more intense as the piece gathered momentum. At the drum kit long time associate Green provided suitably appropriate support, moving between brushes and sticks as the music required before enjoying a drum feature towards the close, underpinned by Harrison’s bass and Kavanagh’s piano vamp.

The new composition “What Does The Future Hold?” was introduced by a passage of unaccompanied piano, subsequently joined by double bass and brushed drums. Initially the mood of this piece was pensive and very much in keeping with the title. Kavanagh’s first piano solo saw him becoming totally immersed in the music, rather like a less vocal Keith Jarrett. Harrison followed with a melodic double bass solo before Kavanagh returned for a more forceful, but no less absorbing, second piano excursion, this seeing Green again moving from brushes to sticks.
A second solo piano passage featuring Minimalist style arpeggios marked the transition into “Bornholmerur (Grandfather Clock)”, a piece from the “No Expectations” album. Named for the titular timepiece at Kavanagh’s maternal grandparents’ home in Denmark this was a sparser offering centred around a gently chiming two note piano motif and was notable for Harrison’s melodic double bass playing and Green’s delicate and finely nuanced drum and cymbal performance, achieved via a combination of brushes and mallets.

The mood of sombre reflection continued into “Old House on the Hill”, another tune from the debut album. Again named for a location near Sligo this was written about a familiar landmark that one day filled Kavanagh with a sense of foreboding, following years of him regarding it with total indifference. Very Edvard Munch. The pensive solo piano introduction had an almost hymnal quality about it, while the addition of bass and drums heralded a fidgety, near free jazz section with Kavanagh’s exploration of the upright acoustic piano’s exposed innards providing the music with a suitably eerie quality.

The new composition “For the Tired and Weary” was addressed to the rather weighty topic of the purpose of Art in an increasingly troubled and volatile world. Again the solo piano introduction was almost hymn like, but the addition of bass and drums added a subtly propulsive groove that reminded me of e.s.t. at times and provided the momentum for Kavanagh’s expansive piano wanderings, this time with Jarrett like vocalisations as his solo built to a peak. Harrison’s subsequent double bass solo and her further dialogue with Kavanagh took the heat out of the situation, with Green eventually adding brushed drums as the piece moved towards a resolution.

A lengthy first set concluded with “Queen Maeve’s Grave”, a tune from the album inspired by a cairn on a Sligo mountain top that is said to mark the resting place of the mythical Queen Maeve. The opening melody is informed by traditional Irish folk music and the folk influence remained implicit throughout, whilst also acting as the jumping off point for jazz improvisation with both Harrison and Kavanagh featuring as soloists amongst some impressive group interplay. The use of Celtic melodic motifs has invited favourable comparisons with the work of the Scottish pianist and composer Fergus McCreadie, himself a previous visitor to BMJ.

The shorter second set commenced with the trio’s lyrical but adventurous take on the jazz standard “Young and Foolish”, written by Albert Hague. An extended solo piano introduction was both thoughtful and reflective, with double bass and delicately brushed drums subsequently added. Harrison’s melodic double bass came to the fore, supported by warm piano chording and delicately brushed drums. A lyrical piano and bass dialogue followed, prior to a solo piano outro as the trio eased us gently into the second half.

The new composition “Dwelling” represented a further exploration of the theme of ‘home’ that informed the first album. This was another piece that began quietly with an arpeggiated solo piano intro prior to the addition of drums and melodic double bass. Kavanagh’s subsequent piano solo was was thoughtful and subtly probing at first, before gradually gaining an impressive momentum as Green once again made the transition from brushes to sticks.

The trio had great fun as they stretched out playfully and expansively around the theme of “Stella by Starlight”, one of the best known of all jazz standards. Propulsive bass and crisp drumming complemented Kavanagh’s effusive and inventive piano explorations, with Harrison later enjoying an extended bass solo, accompanied by Green’s insistent ride cymbal. The drummer then entered into a series of vivacious exchanges with pianist Kavanagh as part of this exciting and thoroughly contemporary take of this much loved standard. Great stuff.

The new Kavanagh composition “Your Drawer Empty” was a more sombre reflection on loss and bereavement that commenced with a passage of unaccompanied bowed bass, eventually joined by soft and gentle piano chording and the delicate patter of Green’s hands on skins and cymbals. Harrison continued with the bow throughout the course of this beautiful but melancholic piece, the controlled beauty of her playing augmented by Green’s sensitive performance at the kit, deploying a combination of sticks and mallets.

Finally we heard to title track from “No Expectations”, a tune about keeping an open mind.   A brief solo piano introduction was followed by the introduction of Green’s drums, the combination of brushes and sticks, augmented by Harrison’s bass, again establishing an e.s.t. like groove. This provided the platform for Kavanagh to stretch out expansively and flamboyantly as the trio built up an impressive and formidable head of steam, collectively ramping up the tension before eventually coming to a gentler resolution with a dialogue between Kavanagh’s piano and Green’s hand drumming.

A near capacity audience at the Melville gave the young trio a terrific reception but were left disappointed with regard to what would have been a very well deserved encore. The trio had exhausted all the material that they had prepared, although it would have been nice if they had perhaps tackled a standard ‘on the fly’. Nevertheless nobody was really complaining after two excellent sets,  of which the first was particularly lengthy. We certainly weren’t short changed.

With a new line-up and with plenty of new material already in the repertoire it will be interesting to see what the Nils Kavanagh Trio do next. That second album will be very keenly awaited.

My thanks to Nils and to Ursula for chatting with me after the show and to Ursula for providing me with review copies of “New Eve”, her duo album with vocalist Sylvie Noble, and “Songs From the Forest”, the soon to be released EP from Orbit Street, a Cardiff based ensemble that features Harrison on bass and vocals and which also includes Green on drums. I hope to take a look at both these new releases in the near future. The Sylvie and Ursula duo made a triumphant visit to BMJ in July 2025. Review here;
https://www.thejazzmann.com/reviews/review/ursula-harrison-and-sylvie-noble-duo-black-mountain-jazz-the-melville-centre-abergavenny-27-07-2025

It was also good to speak with musician Paula Gardiner, Ursula’s mother and the former Head of Jazz at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, who was watching on proudly as her daughter and two of her former students delivered such an accomplished and successful performance.

Tonight’s event was part of a short run of UK performances from the Nils Kavanagh Trio. Forthcoming dares are shown below;

30/04/26 - Bristol Bebop Club

03/05/26 - Seven Arts, Leeds,

04/05/26 - Pizza Express Soho, London,