A look back at the beginning - London based Jazz Singer Oli Gosh reminisces

I recently spoke to someone that was looking for a vintage jazz wedding band in London for hire. As we talked about their plans, the feeling they wanted to give their guests, showing the love they shared; it reminded me of the love - and pain - that I felt when I wrote a song called "Listen" a few years ago.

I wrote “Listen” with a really gifted London producer called Naive Machine during a time when life and death were looking each in the eye. My mum was dying of Alzheimer’s. My baby had just been born. (As u can see in a video I made). One life fading. One beginning. And somewhere in that sacred but painful tension, this song emerged.

“Listen” is about the fragility of life - how quickly it slips through our fingers. It’s a call to wake up from our distractions and to what matters. Why do we get so lost in the noise, in ourselves, in the minutiae ? Until something shakes us , slaps us in the face - a death, a birth, a moment of complete clarity when suddenly we see what’s most important.

This song is for those moments. The ones that break us open and teach us how to live again. Let’s not sleep through life. Let’s listen...

And though the genre of the song belongs to electronica not jazz, that same raw thread - that ache that lives beneath the surface - flows into the music I’m singing now, as a London based Jazz & Caberet Singer.

These classic jazz ballads I’ve stepped into carry their own kind of authentic, raw truth. The truth Billie Holiday bled when she sang. The haunting honesty Nina Simone gave with every note. It takes complete courage to be that vulnerable and something I’m striving for as a jazz singer.

It’s that broken beauty - the kind that rises not from perfection, but from pain that I’m interested in - and this is something that I try to portray through my performances, whether as a soloist or as part of a Jazz trio in my collaboration performances.

My repertoire blends the timeless allure of Jazz with re-imagined pop, rock and house classics; sung in a warm, mellow jazz style. So, if you need to book a Contemporary Jazz Trio in London, you need look no further than Oli Gosh Jazz.

Jazz is like medicine for me. I don’t sing round suffering, but through it. Music is my therapy in dark times and my hope is I can bring that same catharsis to others.

If you are searching for a jazz trio to hire for your venue in London, check out our set list, and contact Oli to book.