Ewan Hastie: Kirkcaldy double bassist named BBC Young Jazz Musician 2022

Double bassist Ewan Hastie has won the award at the ceremony presented by Jamz Supernova and Huw Stephens, both DJs and broadcasters, at London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, in collaboration with the EFG London Jazz Festival.

Born in Edinburgh, and raised in the Langtoun, Ewan started playing the bass guitar at the age of 12, and during his time with the Fife Youth Jazz Orchestra he took up the double bass.

With the National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland, he gained touring experience, visiting Skye, Glasgow, Belfast, and Sligo Jazz Festival, finally enrolling into the Royal Scottish Conservatoire in Glasgow, where he is currently in his fourth and final year.

Ewan has previously received the Mark McKergow Prize for Jazz Improvisation, which was awarded for hard work, diligence, and creativity, and was selected to go to Nuremberg, Germany, for a European Jazz workshop.

Ewan impressed the judging panel (including some of the most celebrated British performers on the current international jazz scene: saxophonist and composer Camilla George; pianist, composer and producer Bill Laurance, also a member of global phenomenon Snarky Puppy; vocalist Claire Martin, OBE; multi-instrumentalist, singer and producer Emma-Jean Thackray; and composer, singer and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson) with an eclectic performance featuring his own composition Impulse, and arrangements of Tricotism by bebop trailblazer Oscar Pettiford, and Chick Corea’s Humpty Dumpty – from 1978 concept album The Mad Hatter.

For the final all of the musicians had the chance to work with and were backed by Nikki Yeoh’s Infinitum. Led by British jazz composer and pianist Nikki Yeoh, the trio also features siblings Michael Mondesir (bass) and Mark Mondesir (drums).

Ewan said: “The other finalists were fantastic and I really did not expect to win. I am overwhelmed with emotions. I am just so grateful to be part of the show and to be able to bring the trophy home to Scotland.”

Judge Claire Martin, OBE said: “We were so impressed with the way Ewan picked three contrasting tunes that he played brilliantly. He has fantastic harmonic knowledge, great chops, and we loved his soulful feeling on the bass. We thought he was daring choosing Chick Corea’s Humpty Dumpty on the bass – that’s just brave. We liked his energy, we liked the way he communicated with the other musicians - all in all he had everything for us. But it was very tough to decide: everybody was great and it was really hard, but in a competition there is always a winner, and we felt that Ewan was very deserving.”

The BBC Young Jazz Musician 2022 Finalists are: pianist Luke Bacchus (21) from London, in his final year as a jazz piano student at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance; Birmingham Conservatoire student pianist Nick Manz (21), born in Durham; Guildhall School of Music and Drama graduate, guitarist Ralph Porrett (23) from Shropshire, currently based in London; and saxophonist Emma Rawicz-Szczerbo (20), born in Devon and a current student at the Royal Academy of Music in London.