Preview: London Jazz Festival

The London Jazz Festival is not just for Londoners, says critic Philip Johnson

The riches bequeathed to the capital by the London Jazz Festival (see www.londonjazzfestival.org.uk for the full line-up and venue details), which runs from Friday to Sunday 25 November, also filter down to the provinces, as a number of big festival attractions tour around the country. The South Bank show by star saxophonist Joshua Redman on 22 November, for example, is already sold out but you can still catch Redman on his travels in Basingstoke, Bristol, Birmingham and Poole (see www.serious.org.uk for more details).

Similarly, the LJF date next Sunday by desert blues guitarist Vieux Farka Touré (son of the late Ali Farka Touré), is part of Heatwave, a 10-date British tour beginning in Bristol on Thursday and ending in Glasgow on 25 November, and also starring Anglo-Brazilian band Zeep (see www.heatwave. org.uk for details).

The Britten Sinfonia's In the Spirit of Gil and Miles, an orchestral programme conducted by Gil Goldstein (pictured) and dedicated to the superlative music of Gil Evans with Miles Davis, is on at London's QEH (0871 663 2500) on 24 November or at Birmingham's newly re-opened Town Hall (0121 780 3333) on 27 Novemberember.

Many of the most interesting-looking LJF dates are one-offs, including the big band of composer/trumpeter Charles Tolliver (19 November) and this Friday's opening QEH concert with the wonderfully atmospheric film noir sounds of Charlie Haden's Quartet West. And wherever you live, there's plenty of the LJF on BBC Radio 3 (see www.bbc.co.uk /radio3/ londonjazzfestival).

In December, there's an intriguing jazz/classical/film crossover event in London and Bristol when saxophonist Andy Sheppard and guitarist Adrian Utley are the star soloists in a new orchestral score by Goldfrapp's Will Gregory for the outstanding silent film He Who Gets Slapped. Charles Hazlewood conducts the BBC Concert Orchestra at Bristol Colston Hall (0117 922 3686) on 1 December, and London South Bank QEH on 3 December.

Please check listings – all dates are subject to change