Robert Glasper returns this month with his third album for Blue Note. In two distinctive halves, one with his trio of Vicente Archer and Chris Dave, the other with his hip hop band The Experiment, the pianist has moved on leaps and bounds in a short few years. It’s a move to present jazz and hip hop on equal terms, as influenced on the one hand by the likes of Herbie Hancock, and on the other by the daisy age of De La Soul. Interview:: Stephen Graham

It was the last night of a quick turnaround tour, and a jazz club was newly reopening after a refurbishment that still needed a few touches here and there. Standing around waiting for the gig to start the place had a happy-go-lucky feel yet the crowd was easily shushed when the time came. In the meantime there were just a few minutes for someone to tape up that hanging fuse as a bloke scrambled up a ladder to peer at the ceiling, making the necessary fix.

It’s Hoxton in London, just round the corner from the site of the old Bass Clef jazz club which itself became a hub for the soul jazz and acid jazz of the 1990s when the joint was briefly renamed the Blue Note, before transforming itself once again as Britart and digital design culture swept the area later that decade.

This is an extract from Jazzwise Issue #134 – to read the full article click here to subscribe and receive a FREE Blue Note CD