Biography
Maisha function as a London-rooted jazz ensemble directed by drummer and arranger Jake Long, whose sound fuses modal jazz explorations pioneered by Alice Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders. Their initial 2016 release, the EP Welcome to a New Welcome, appeared via Jazz Refreshed and rapidly elevated the group within Britain’s jazz community. Selected in 2018 for Brownswood Recordings’ landmark compilation We Out Here, which surveyed London’s jazz landscape, Maisha emerged among its standout performers. Once signed to the imprint, the band delivered its first full-length album, There Is a Place, that same year; the project registered on global streaming rankings and drew critical notice, landing on numerous reviewers’ end-of-year best-album selections. The recording enabled extensive international touring, during which the musicians formed a live alliance with alto saxophonist Gary Bartz.
Long established Maisha near the end of 2015 by enlisting tenor saxophonist Nubya Garcia and guitarist Shirley Tetteh, both also active in Nérija. He further assembled pianist and keyboardist Amané Suganami, known for work with Jorja Smith, bassist Twm Dylan, whose credits include Rosie Turton and Jimmy Aldridge & Sid Goldsmith, plus drummer and percussionist Tim Doyle, associated with Cykada and Don Kipper. Following brief composition and rehearsal sessions, the group debuted at Deptford’s Royal Albert Pub during the “Good Evening Arts” event. Jazz Refreshed issued Welcome to a New Welcome digitally in May 2016, capturing three live selections from that opening performance; the tracks climbed Britain’s jazz charts and entered playlists assembled by international DJs.
During planning for We Out Here by Gilles Peterson and Shabaka Hutchings, Maisha’s piece “Inside the Acorn” was chosen to open the collection because it captured the broad cultural and sonic range of London’s linked music community. Fellow contributors encompassed Garcia’s quintet, Ezra Collective, Theon Cross, Moses Boyd, Hutchings, and pianist Joe Armon-Jones. Although the 2018 compilation came to symbolize London’s jazz movement, Maisha’s opening track received BBC and French national radio exposure while ascending streaming rankings.
Following repeated London engagements, Maisha booked time at Soup Studios to record its debut album, with David Holmes handling engineering and mixing duties. Beyond the core sextet, the sessions incorporated percussionist Yahael Camara-Onono from the Balimaya Project and trumpeter Axel Kaner-Lindstrom of Cykada and the Levitation Orchestra, alongside harpist Maria Zofia Osuchowska and a string quartet. After completion, the material reached Peterson, prompting the Brownswood Recordings contract and the album’s 2018 release.
There Is a Place highlighted the ensemble’s collective precision and nuance by granting every instrument equal weight in the overall texture. Daily and monthly outlets, European, Asian, and North American club DJs, and jazz commentators all offered widespread praise, placing the set among the year’s strongest releases. Reviewers noted how Maisha connected stylistic threads running from Alice Coltrane and Sun Ra through Kamasi Washington and Sons of Kemet. The Worldwide Awards named the album a 2019 Jazz Album of the Year nominee.
Streaming and sales traction from There Is a Place supported expanded touring that reached Switzerland, Turkey, Poland, and additional territories. Festival appearances drew consistent attention from both writers and audiences. To accommodate road schedules and members’ separate commitments, Long enlarged the lineup into an almost revolving roster of supplementary performers that included Binker Golding, Tamar Osborn, Wayne Francis, Al Macsween, Artie Zaitz, and Arnaud Guichard. Long observed that such rotations permitted visiting musicians to contribute their distinct voices fully to Maisha’s repertoire.
Peterson launched the first We Out Here Festival in 2019 and programmed Maisha for both its own concert and a collaborative set supporting 78-year-old American saxophonist and jazz-funk figure Gary Bartz, who praised the group’s attentive interplay. The successful evening led to a Royal Albert Hall appearance during the EFG London Jazz Festival, followed by a two-day session at a Dutch studio with direct-to-disc specialists Night Dreamer Records. The musicians recorded five selections, among them new versions of Bartz’s “Uhuru Sasa” from the 1971 Milestone album Harlem Bush Music: Uhuru and “Doctor Follows Dance” from the 1973 Prestige release Follow the Medicine Man, plus three additional pieces composed collectively in the studio. Night Dreamer Direct-to-Disc Sessions emerged in July 2020, two months before Bartz turned 80.
Later that year Maisha issued the Open the Gates EP through Brownswood Recordings in partnership with the Vinyl Factory, which pressed the edition on fully recycled vinyl; the release contained the 17-minute track “Epic” and a live rendering of the We Out Here selection “Osiris.”
Long established Maisha near the end of 2015 by enlisting tenor saxophonist Nubya Garcia and guitarist Shirley Tetteh, both also active in Nérija. He further assembled pianist and keyboardist Amané Suganami, known for work with Jorja Smith, bassist Twm Dylan, whose credits include Rosie Turton and Jimmy Aldridge & Sid Goldsmith, plus drummer and percussionist Tim Doyle, associated with Cykada and Don Kipper. Following brief composition and rehearsal sessions, the group debuted at Deptford’s Royal Albert Pub during the “Good Evening Arts” event. Jazz Refreshed issued Welcome to a New Welcome digitally in May 2016, capturing three live selections from that opening performance; the tracks climbed Britain’s jazz charts and entered playlists assembled by international DJs.
During planning for We Out Here by Gilles Peterson and Shabaka Hutchings, Maisha’s piece “Inside the Acorn” was chosen to open the collection because it captured the broad cultural and sonic range of London’s linked music community. Fellow contributors encompassed Garcia’s quintet, Ezra Collective, Theon Cross, Moses Boyd, Hutchings, and pianist Joe Armon-Jones. Although the 2018 compilation came to symbolize London’s jazz movement, Maisha’s opening track received BBC and French national radio exposure while ascending streaming rankings.
Following repeated London engagements, Maisha booked time at Soup Studios to record its debut album, with David Holmes handling engineering and mixing duties. Beyond the core sextet, the sessions incorporated percussionist Yahael Camara-Onono from the Balimaya Project and trumpeter Axel Kaner-Lindstrom of Cykada and the Levitation Orchestra, alongside harpist Maria Zofia Osuchowska and a string quartet. After completion, the material reached Peterson, prompting the Brownswood Recordings contract and the album’s 2018 release.
There Is a Place highlighted the ensemble’s collective precision and nuance by granting every instrument equal weight in the overall texture. Daily and monthly outlets, European, Asian, and North American club DJs, and jazz commentators all offered widespread praise, placing the set among the year’s strongest releases. Reviewers noted how Maisha connected stylistic threads running from Alice Coltrane and Sun Ra through Kamasi Washington and Sons of Kemet. The Worldwide Awards named the album a 2019 Jazz Album of the Year nominee.
Streaming and sales traction from There Is a Place supported expanded touring that reached Switzerland, Turkey, Poland, and additional territories. Festival appearances drew consistent attention from both writers and audiences. To accommodate road schedules and members’ separate commitments, Long enlarged the lineup into an almost revolving roster of supplementary performers that included Binker Golding, Tamar Osborn, Wayne Francis, Al Macsween, Artie Zaitz, and Arnaud Guichard. Long observed that such rotations permitted visiting musicians to contribute their distinct voices fully to Maisha’s repertoire.
Peterson launched the first We Out Here Festival in 2019 and programmed Maisha for both its own concert and a collaborative set supporting 78-year-old American saxophonist and jazz-funk figure Gary Bartz, who praised the group’s attentive interplay. The successful evening led to a Royal Albert Hall appearance during the EFG London Jazz Festival, followed by a two-day session at a Dutch studio with direct-to-disc specialists Night Dreamer Records. The musicians recorded five selections, among them new versions of Bartz’s “Uhuru Sasa” from the 1971 Milestone album Harlem Bush Music: Uhuru and “Doctor Follows Dance” from the 1973 Prestige release Follow the Medicine Man, plus three additional pieces composed collectively in the studio. Night Dreamer Direct-to-Disc Sessions emerged in July 2020, two months before Bartz turned 80.
Later that year Maisha issued the Open the Gates EP through Brownswood Recordings in partnership with the Vinyl Factory, which pressed the edition on fully recycled vinyl; the release contained the 17-minute track “Epic” and a live rendering of the We Out Here selection “Osiris.”
Albums
Singles
