IT WAS a hot night in Harrogate, in more ways than one. Perhaps the high temperature accounted for the poor attendance at this gig, the last of the Harrogate International Festival, by Soweto Kinch, breathless jazzman and preacher of rap.

Or maybe people don’t quite know what to make of Kinch. Whatever, this was a good and a courageous choice for a festival which likes to mix the mainstream more left-field artists.

Kinch is a self-taught, Oxford-educated sax player who thought about being a journalist before music opened another door, thanks to the patronage of Courtney Pine and Gary Crosby.

He likes to throw old and new values into the jazz blender, and what comes out is a clever and entertaining blur of idioms. If the music is inspired by bop and post-bop, the rapping is beguilingly English in feel and addresses topics personal and political.

A core three-piece band of guitar, double-bass/electric bass and drums was filled out with a horn trio and a singer, providing some of the evening’s fullest and most rewarding music.

The smallish but appreciated audience enjoyed itself, and contributed enthusiastically to a free-form bit of improvised rap and jazz, shouting out words on a freedom theme.

As for Soweto, he threw himself into the performance with charm and wit, and blew out notes from his sax like a man possessed with the restless spirit of jazz, in what amounted to a concert performance of his new album, The New Emancipation. Hot indeed.