“Shivraj Singh, formerly with The Jazzlines Ensemble and leading his own band since the age of 15 showed himself to be a very fine bass player with no problem in carrying the theme of the music as well as being the complete heartbeat of the quartet.”

Sussex JazzMag – Xhosa Cole Quartet 

Shivraj Singh is an established double and electric bass player from Smethwick in Birmingham, UK. He was born into an Indian family where he is a first generation British Indian. His first experience playing was at a very young age through the youth outreach programme ran by Jazzlines (B:Music) called the Jazzlines Summer School in the heart of Birmingham. This mission of this programme was to provide free Jazz lessons to children from underprivileged backgrounds. During the programme he performed and studied with some of Britain’s Jazz giants. Nikki Isle, Shabaka Hutchings, Reuben James, Kit Downes and Gareth Lockrane were all part of the programme.

Shivraj later went on to study at the decorated Royal Birmingham Conservatoire (2015-2019) graduating with a 2.1 degree. He was taught by Mark Hodgson who has played with Amy Winehouse and The Rolling Stones, John O’Gallagher who wrote the acclaimed book ‘Twelve Tone Improvisation’, Arnie Somogyi who has performed with Eddie Henderson, Omar and Tom Jones and legendary classical bassist Thomas Martin who has performed as principle double bass player for City of Birmingham Orchestra

Over the course of his short career so far, he has performed with Soweto Kinch, Xhosa Cole, Clark Tracey, Percy Pursglove, Sara Coleman, Denys Baptiste, Nikki Yeoh, Liam Noble, Jean Toussaint, Phil Robson, and the Black Voices to name but a few. He has played at many notable venues around the UK and abroad such as the Jazz Cafe, Pizza Express and The Vortex Jazz Club in London. Some of the world-renowned festivals he has played at are Cheltenham Jazz Festival, A Love Supreme Jazz festival and JAZZFEST in Trondheim, Norway

Critically acclaimed project, Loophole featuring Steve Saunders on Guitar, Shivraj Singh on Bass and Luke D’Aulerio on Drums is about finding a way to break the cycle of monotony in Jazz music. The direction of the music experiments with the boundaries of Jazz music incorporating influences from ambient sounds of Aphex Twin to the fast free form of Amok Amor. Recently, the band performed a new set of music commissioned by Birmingham Jazz supported by Arts Council England. The performances received with wide spread acclaimed featuring in London Jazz News and were to sold out shows in Birmingham which featured special guest Soweto Kinch.

He is a notable sideman in bands in Birmingham; one of these being the BBC Young Jazz Musician of the year’s band – the Xhosa Cole Quartet. Shivraj and Xhosa have had a long-standing relationship, having grown up playing together in the Jazzlines Ensemble. This band mixes the musical styles of Hard Bop, Post-Bop and Modal music effortlessly drawing on influences such as John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins. Shivraj helped produce Xhosa’s last album Ibeji which was received with critical acclaim and partly funded by the Peter Whittingham Award.