THE Howden Live venue, the Shire Hall, must be one of the best in the region - an ample stage, a good-sized room with cabaret-style tables and great acoustics.

Last Saturday Clare Teal was able to employ the full dynamics of her voice and her band over her programme drawn from the Great American songbook. Reeds player Mark Crooks turned out to have been set on the jazz trail as a pupil at Tadcaster Grammar School, taught by none other than York's own Martin Boyd.

Clare Teal will be at the Leeds College of Music with the College Big Band, directed by Al Wood, on Thursday (18th) at 7.30pm, details from 0113 222 3434. Martin Boyd is preparing his band for a short northern tour with the fiery Scottish trumpeter Bruce Adams towards the end of this month.

There will be a great start to the weekend tonight when Snake Davis comes to Wakefield Jazz, astonishingly his 39th visit to the club since it started in 1987. The celebrity credentials of Harrogate-born Snake are well-known - musical director for the Eurythmics, Lisa Stansfield and many more. Tonight Snake will bring his own band, details from 01924 782339.

Jazz at the Spa has settled into its new venue, the Trustees Hall, Boston Spa. Tomorrow night's (13th) band is a new name to me, Dave Mott and Friends, more details from 01937 842544/842636.

The consistently exciting J Night series continues on Sunday (14th) at Hull Truck Theatre with Pinese Saul and her African Big Band. According to The Guardian, the leader of the South African Gospel Singers is the undisputed Queen of Afro Jazz. She will perform songs from her remarkable career, from the Ipi Tombi stage show of the 1970s, to Township Express in the 1990s. This could be the gig of the week. Contact the box office (01482 323638) for more details.

In York, the Sunday night jam session at the Black Swan, Peasholme Green, continues to be one of the best gigs around, with a storming resident band.

On Tuesday, Scarborough Jazz hosts a second visit by Edinburgh-based singer Freddie King. Details from 01723 379818. On Wednesday, Hulljazz presents Italian clarinettist Luca Luciano with his quartet, details from 01482 492868.

Also on Wednesday, Leeds Jazz presents one of its favourite drummers, the American Jim Black, with the band Pachora, as ever an excitingly fresh take on the jazz idiom. Details from 0113 274 2486.

In York on Wednesday, the place to be will be the Black Swan, for the second famous jam session of the week, which like the Sunday session, features a refreshingly younger group of musicians.

The trombone can be a cumbersome instrument and its players tend to be overshadowed by the sexy saxophone and the bright-sounding trumpet. However, JJ Johnson bucked the trend by developing a burnished tone and staggering technique.

Two handsomely packaged re-issues from 1988 show JJ at the top of his form, Standards: Live At The Village Vanguard and Quintergy: Live at the Village Vanguard (Emarcy). Both are wonderfully atmospheric of the live club ambience and feature a prime group with Ralph Moore (saxophones), Stanley Cowell, Rufus Reid and Victor Lewis.

Standards is a programme of blues, ballads and familiar melodies such as My Funny Valentine, Misty, Just Friends and Autumn Leaves.

Quintergy opens with a surprising, but witty version of the old Trad warhorse When The Saints Go Marching In and on familiar tunes such as Blue Bossa, Johnson invents some unique harmonies and voicings between the trombone and saxophone. For variety, he also passes the lead melodies between the instruments and creates duets with the bass, particularly moving on Sonny Stitt's Bud's Blues.

As we can expect from his years of composing for films and TV, Johnson is a master of pacing and atmosphere in his own tunes. The angularity of his original Quintergy contrasts with the languid fluency of the following track, Lament. This is music of adventure, swing and poise and puts JJ Johnson up on the thinly populated pinnacle of inspired trombonists alongside Jack Teagarden and Frank Rosolino.

Updated: 15:30 Thursday, March 11, 2004