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Simcock - leading the new wave of British jazz (photo: Ron Beenen)

Gwilym Simcock very nearly didn’t become a jazz musician. Born in Bangor and brought up in Cheshire, from a young age this prodigious musical talent was destined to become a classical concert pianist.

Immersed in the music of Chopin, Rachmaninov and Stravinsky, he left home at the age of nine to study classical piano at the prestigious Chetham School of Music in Manchester. There his musical talent flourished and was soon playing concertos to an international audience.

But at the age of 15 one of his teachers, ex-Loose Tubes bassist Steve Berry, gave Simcock a compilation tape that radically changed his musical direction. Track 1 on the cassette was Questar by Keith Jarrett and this was the first nine minutes and nine seconds of jazz that Simcock had ever heard. He was immediately hooked. “I love the soul and beauty in his music,” says Simcock. “I think that he is technically the greatest piano player there has ever been in our music.”

Simcock went on to study jazz at the Royal Academy of Music in London before bursting onto British jazz scene. His playing features on 22 different albums, he has won a clutch of awards and last year he composed and played an ambitious classical-jazz concerto as part of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall.

He has also rubbed shoulders with some of jazz’s greatest players, recording and playing live with Kenny Wheeler, Dave Holland, Lee Konitz and Chick Corea. So impressed was Corea that after one performance he hailed Simcock “a creative genius”.

Now aged 28 Simcock is at the vanguard of the modern jazz scene, representing a new wave of exciting new British artists that are making waves on the international scene. On 16 November Simcock will release his second album as a leader and soloist. A double CD, running to more than two hours, Blues Vignette is an all-acoustic recording that sees Simcock laying claim to his style. It’s more focused than his 2007 debut, Perception, which meandered across different genres, including fusion, but offered clues to Simcock’s considerable talent.

Simcock's second album as a leader

On Blues Vignette Simcock’s playing is a mixture of confident virtuosity and thoughtful gentility. His compositions have a strong sense of melody and harmony (Simcock is gifted with perfect pitch), but his music is not hemmed-in by orthodoxy and ranges across a number of different styles.

“I knew at the time of my first album that it was a calling card for different aspects of music I was making,” says Simcock. “With my music I want to be accessible, with a strong thread of melody throughout, whilst allowing for some exploration into harmonic territory that, at times, goes away from the conventional jazz direction.”

Blues Vignette includes a number of unaccompanied performances. This is something that live audiences have already had a taste of, witnessing his slim fingers dart over the keys with extraordinary fluidity. They have also seen him perform duets with British jazz pianist and Simcock’s former teacher, John Taylor. Two Steinway grand pianos are arranged on stage, line astern. With Simcock on the left and Taylor on the right, they take turns to create short solo improvised melodies, each making subtle musical references to the other’s work, ping-ponging back and forth. It is intense, powerful music – dueling via duet – and it has audiences wide-eyed.

“Those gigs were a very special experience for me. It was like having a lesson in spontaneous creation every time [Taylor] played something,” Simcock says modestly, who was an equal match for his master.

In his Sussex studio, Simcock recorded many hours of improvised material for Blues Vignette. “I chose a small selection that I thought worked well as individual pieces and fitted with the rest of the material on the CD. I can quite happily sit down at home for hours just playing. It’s crafting the shape of the improvising which is one of the hardest challenges,” he says.

His new album explores other territory, too. In a reference to his classical upbringing Simcock performs a solo interpretation of Grieg’s Piano Concerto and duets with classical cellist Cara Berridge. The second CD features drummer James Maddren, a recent graduate of the Royal Academy, and Russian double bassist Yuri Goubolev, and the trio play a mixture of Simcock’s compositions and arrangements of jazz standards, such as Gershwin’s Nice Work If You Can Get It. “I have found some really special co-conspirators to play with,” he says.

What is striking about Simcock’s new work are the parallels with Keith Jarrett’s music. Simcock’s solo improvisation has a more than a nod to Jarretts’s recent solo albums, The Carnegie Hall Concert and Paris / London. And Simcock’s trio seems influenced by Jarrett’s great trio works such as Inside Out and Whisper Not.  “It’s hugely flattering to be even mentioned in the same breath as someone who is the best piano player in the genre in which I work,” says Simcock. “[Because] he has covered such a wide variety of styles, there is always bound to be similarities given that we are both classically trained musicians who, amongst other things, are fascinated with extended harmonic language.”

Simcock will begin a British tour next month to coincide with his album launch. Befitting his talents and background, he will perform in a range of settings – solo, duets with John Taylor, with his new trio, and even performing with a 100-piece choir. His tour will conclude with a performance at Cardiff University; born in Wales, this will be Simcock’s “home coming” gig.  But for this, and the massive boost he has given to British jazz, we have to thank a single compilation tape with Keith Jarrett on Track 1.

Blues Vignette is released on 16 November by Basho Records.

Gwilym Simcock will play Cardiff University on 8 December.