The Kansas Smitty's House Band

Fresh from a UK-tour that included selling out four nights at Cheltenham Jazz Festival, The Kansas Smitty’s House Band arrive back in London at Shoreditch Town Hall for an EFG London Jazz Festival special.

The Kansas Smitty’s House Band have been quietly, or depending on where you’ve been spending your evenings, not so quietly, carving out a name for themselves as one of the driving forces in the UK jazz scene. Their reputation, built on their incendiary live shows, including four sold out main shows at Ronnie Scott’s, has recently been cemented by the release of their full debut album and the opening of their own bar venue in East London.

Both bar and band have received praise across the jazz and mainstream press, with extensive coverage from The Evening Standard, and reviews in the Sunday Times and Telegraph. The Band's debut record was nominated as one of the top jazz albums of 2015 by the Telegraph. The Sunday Times summed it up nicely, saying ‘Conservatories or cocktails? If jazz is to survive it will need more bands (like this one)'. The House Band don't like to be boxed in.

As their debut album exemplifies, they make wide use of the sour mash of styles that has allowed them to cross the divides between generations and dispositions. Moving through sounds of swing, blues, R&B, New Orleans ethnic music, and gospel, they relentlessly pursue a sound of their own, seeking out and creating a genre-blind audience for their music.