THE Basement Jazz Club, the new York jazz project mounted by Harkirit Boparai, will welcome the Tom Millar Quartet to The Basement at City Screen on September 19.

Pianist and composer Millar will be promoting Unnatural Events, his debut album released on the innovative new label Spark four days earlier, recorded with his longstanding quartet members Misha Mullov-Abbado on bass, Alex Munk on guitar and Dave Storey on drums.

All are band leaders in their own right. "I was looking for musicians who would be musically supportive and versatile, with a deep understanding of what I expect to bring my compositions to life," says Millar. "It was such a pleasure to have them all in the studio with me, and they came with such a clear awareness of when to suggest ideas for improving or changing the music I brought."

Munk's soaring guitar sound complements Millar's piano playing, as both stretch out over the rhythm section's emphatic grooves. The title track, for example, is a groove tune based around the key of E minor, written while listening to Jan Garbarek’s album Afric Pepperbird.

“It was kind of my take on this music, but of course ends up being very different," says Millar. "It was also my response to a suggestion from trumpeter Dave Douglas to try writing pieces from different starting points each time. This was once of my first compositions to come out of a bass line. It also begins with a metrical trick which hopefully disguises the time signature initially."

Singer/songwriter Alice Zawadzki joins the quartet for two numbers, Choro and Inversnaid. "Inversnaid was the first song with lyrics I wrote for the band," says Millar. "To my surprise I found this poem by the rather austere Christian Victorian poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, which really spoke to me with its environmentalist message and beautiful natural imagery, particularly apt in a current age where man-made global warming is going to completely transform life on our planet, even within our lifespans."

Further songs on an album inspired by places and people important to Millar are the soulful ballad Park Hill; the rock-out anthems The Seafarer, Power Chord Thing and Woad, and Azura Days, written after a trip around the Mediterranean.

Millar, who was born in Sydney, Australia, grew up in London and read music at King’s College, Cambridge. He graduated from the Royal Academy of Music, London, with a master's degree in jazz piano and has been studying with Django Bates in Switzerland. Unnatural Events was recorded with funding from an Emerging Excellence Award from Help Musicians UK, the Jazz Services’ Recording Support Scheme and a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter.

The Basement Jazz Club hosted the Emily Francis Trio on August 10 and upcoming gigs include Perpetual Motion Machine on September 8; University of York student Alex James, September 15; Newcastle combo Not Now Charlie, October 6, and jazz-leaning London instrumental quartet Phoenician Blinds, October 20. Doors open at 8pm; tickets can be booked at thebasementyork.co.uk/basement-jazz