ARQ: the Alison Rayner Quintet
Sat 23 May
|The Jazz Centre UK
Composer and bassist Alison Rayner brings her longstanding quintet to the JCUK for their first Southend date for many a year...
Time & Location
23 May 2026, 14:00 – 16:00
The Jazz Centre UK, The Jazz Centre UK, Beecroft Art Gallery, Victoria Ave, Southend-on-Sea SS2 6EX, UK
About the Event
Much-lauded, award-winning and eclectic quintet ARQ, led by bassist and composer Alison Rayner, has spent twelve years crafting a unique sound that draws on jazz, folk, pop and Latin influences. They are widely celebrated for their four album releases and twelve years of UK & European touring across jazz clubs, concert halls and international festivals, regularly selling out London clubs such as Ronnie Scott’s and the Pizza Express Jazz Club, as well as regional venues across the UK. ARQ have been winners in both the Parliamentary Jazz Awards and the British Jazz Awards and their 2025 album Sema4 was awarded Presto Music Jazz Recording of the Year.
ARQ’s new release Sema4 showcases the quintet’s “stylistic virtuosity and masterful interplay” and has received extensive airplay, press coverage, reviews and live radio sessions, such as Radio 3 ‘In Tune’ show. Previous releases: August (2014) , A Magic
Life (2016) and Short Stories (2019) all garnered press acclaim and international radio play, with Rayner winning a coveted Ivor Novello Composer Award for ‘There is a Crack in Everything’ from Short Stories.
This performance will feature music from all four ARQ albums, whilst emphasising their latest release. Expect richly nuanced compositions, rhythmic interplay and folk-infused melodies – music that is inventive, colourful and unfailingly melodic, possessed of a strong narrative and cinematic quality.
★ Presto Music Awards Jazz Recording of the Year 2025
Tickets
Alison Rayner Quintet
From £8.00 to £15.00
£15.00
+£0.38 ticket service fee
£8.00
+£0.20 ticket service fee
Total
£0.00