Kansas Smitty’s Jazz – American Jazz Bar in the East End
There’s a new joint in town, Kansas Smitty’s. As seems with most new openings nowadays, it’s in the East End, Broadway Market to be exact.
hard at work, mixing those Juleps
Kansas Smitty’s styles itself as a Jazz and Julep bar. The place is named after its resident house band, an 8 piece ensemble of young and enthusiastic, not to mention fabulous jazz musicians. As a matter of fact, the idea of opening a place came about because the band was so successful playing at other venues that they decided they needed a home of their own.
They found it in the basement of the “Off-Broadway”. It’s a tiny place with room for just about 60 people, not sure if that’s including the band or not! Kansan Smitty are all about enjoying the music. I’d say their style is swing with dash of blues thrown in the mix. They say they are “… a mash of jazz genres, the Kansas Smitty’s gritty musical style is influenced by the sounds of New York, New Orleans, Paris, and Havana….” Whatever you want to call it, it was food fun!
Their aim is to get Jazz in the UK out of the ghetto of expensive clubs or gimmicky theme nights, “…they want to open up this exciting and evolving genre of music to a new, young audience and start a new trend in the live music scene.” The bar was fun and open, I chatted with some of the band members while we were all waiting for pizza at Franco Manca’s across the street during their break and they were seriously such a lovely bunch of fellows.
Kansas Smitty, the band
I almost forgot to mention the cocktail list. It’s all Juleps, there are about 8 – 10 different versions of the Mint Julep, some made with coffee, come made with scotch and even garnished with banana chips. It was good fun and another cool place to hang out in the East.