VA - Soul Jazz Records Presents LONDON JAZZ CLASSICS (2026) [Hi-Res]

London Jazz Classics originally came out in 1993, the first album ever to be released on Soul Jazz Records. The album brought together rare and obscure dance tracks in a unique mix of jazz dance and fusion, funk, Brazilian and Latin grooves.

The album was ironically titled. None of the music was from London, none of the music was traditionally classified as jazz, and all of the tracks were at the time practically unknown to most people. Instead, these were tracks that were filling dancefloors in a nascent jazz dance scene in London being created by a small group of DJs, Paul Murphy, Gilles Peterson, Sylvester, Patrick Forge and a few others.

As demand for these rare groove jazz tracks grew, previously unknown records such as Alive!’s Skindo Le Le, Doug Richardson’s Salsa Mama, Carlos Franzetti’s Cocoa Funk and Emilio Santiago’s Bananeira became sought after and even harder-to-find items, with original copies going for hundreds of pounds.

These tracks became part of the soundtrack to this jazz dance scene, which has now spread across the world. This music paved the way for the arrival of many of the UK’s new wave of current artists such as Shabaka Hutchings, Nubya Garcia and Ezra Collective, who today offer a uniquely London sensibility of fusing jazz with wide-ranging cultural influences, everything from Afrobeat to soul.

London Jazz Classics was the first album to bring the jazz dance music featured here to a wider audience. More than 30 years since its initial release, Soul Jazz Records release this new 2026 edition, bringing the music to a new generation of listeners once more.