Sunday Night Jazz At Quill

Confidentials 4 March 2016

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THE SETTING is integral to appreciating Jazz music – well, that’s what the storybooks would have us believe.

‘Quill allows you to have an intimate chit-chat over candlelight’

Take F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby and his glorious depiction of the jazz age: 1920s America before the Great Depression, where flapper dresses were a la mode and ‘gin was the national drink and sex the national obsession.’

Jazz music, whether heard in lavish parties for middle class America or in the illicit speakeasies, was meant to be experienced in situ.

On a late Sunday evening, when simmering down from the weekend is the only operative, Sunday Night Jazz at King Street’s new fine-dining restaurant sets the perfect jazz scene:

You sit in the downstairs bar, all sultrily lit and Old Hollywood motion picture grey, and wait to be served upon by dapper dressed barmen with braces clipped to their trousers and crisp blue shirts. Before the jazz band take to their pew, everyone speaks at a hush level; this is not a rollicking, knees-up affair but a gentle easy-listening meander. The evening’s musicians, two men with a keyboard and a trumpet, play from a catalogue of crowd favourites; from Wonderful World to a jazzy rework of Pharrell William’s buoyant track Happy. The mood switches from romantic to tap-your-foot lively and back again. It’s delightful.

Most importantly the evening provides ample opportunity to converse. While many bars shout your attention with music too loud and style too hip, Quill allows you to have an intimate chit-chat over candlelight, or even, just sit back and listen. Nothing too fussy. Nothing too ostentatious. But something quite special.

Also keep an eye out for James Bradshaw performing at Quill

Of course this is not Prohibition and throughout the evening cocktails arrive in the best way, in multiples of two. If you have an appetite for Jazz music you may have a thirst for the usual jazz alcoholic accompaniments: mainly gin.

Naturally, the cocktail menu is jazz-themed and features nine ‘Jazz Club Specials’.

As a gin lover, the ‘Bye Bye Blackbird’ (gin, lemon, rhubarb, celery, prosecco) was recommended and described as having a distinct taste of liquorice blackjack sweets. It was far less sickly, yet still feminine and elegant.

Bourbon cocktail, ‘The Declaration’, is smooth, with chocolatey accents, matching perfectly with the smooth chocolatey sounds from the evening’s musical compere.

The Declaration

‘Letters From Seville’, an aperol based cocktail, poured in glasses large enough for burlesques dancers to swim in, was popular with guests. Fresh thyme wafts through adding a little muscle to the fruity concoction.