Already, we've had alto saxophonists Soweto Kinch and Chris Bowden representing a triumphant upsurge on the Birmingham jazz scene. Now it's the turn of trumpeter Bryan Corbett, recently playing an attention-gathering gig at the Cheltenham Festival and now releasing Corbenova, his second album.

This new disc presents a radical contrast after Bryan's acoustic standards debut, turning on to the liquid fusion properties of early 1970s Miles, then running right up to areas inhabited by this year's Gerard Presencer release. The beats and synthesiser washes are swirling and atmospheric, framing a series of crystalline trumpet or flugel horn improvisations. Corbett bas succeeded in creating a commercial release that will attract outsiders to jazz, but one which will surely satisfy any open-minded old soldiers.

"It's a very big shift," Bryan agrees. "If you really want to sell records, you've got to come up with something new, and one of my biggest aims is to take jazz to a younger audience. It's a natural progression. The commercial market: as a young player, I've got to enter it. That's the idea of the crossover. I'm not going straight down the Jazz FM smooth alley, there's a lot of brickbat samples coming from the '70s, a lot of analogue instrumentation. It's about sound and vibes, really. It's not about proving that you're the best player in the world. It can work as background music, to give out a really nice, chilled-out vibe. But in a live setting it can be very bard-hitting. For the live show, I'd use a line-up with two drummers, running samplers and computerised stuff, as well as having the live stuff going on top of it. If someone wants to invest in me to do a smooth groove album, then fair enough, but if I'm left to my own devices,
I'll just try to do that in a slightly different way. It sounds very live, because we've used all live drum samples."

Bryan grew up in Bromyard, near Hereford, where he attended its Sixth Form College. Then he did a degree in Liverpool, with part of his time spent at Manchester's Royal Northern College Of Music. This was a general music course rather than one of those new-fangled specialist jazz options. He started playing with the college and university big bands as well as gigging with his father Stuart, who's now working at the London College Of Music where he's involved in writing the jazz syllabus.

Upon arriving in Birmingham, Bryan found work at a shop called Musical Instrument Repairs £t Sales, acting as their resident brass and woodwind expert. He stayed there for three years, making contacts that would lead to further big band work.

Corbett formed his quintet at quite an early stage. "Initially, I used guitar, drums, bass, saxophone and trumpet," be recalls. "The saxophone player then left to go on the ships. I replaced him with another sax player called Mark Overton, who left to do the UB40 world tour. And then I decided to add Levi French on Rhodes and piano, rather than getting another front line."

Bryan bad a regular gig at the Birmingham Ronnie Scott's for the last six months of its existence, and now he's a member of South African singer Esther Miller's band and the resident Ty's All-Stars. Even though Corbett's only been living in Birmingham for six years, this tall stringbean cat has become an integral presence, now running his own quartet and programming the music down at Ty's Bar & Restaurant.

This haunt is the UK's only Kashmiri curry-andcornet venue, and its owner Ty Mahmood is a committed supporter of live jazz, presenting bands for five nights of the week. Lately, he's been expanding the datesheet with nationallyknown names, but that's not to say that the indigenous talent doesn't have its own substantial qualities. Ty's newest ventures involve the running of a recording studio and record label, both operated from the restaurant premises.

Indeed, Corbett can play a Ty's gig until the early hours, then retire to his flat above the venue, roll out of bed the next morning and stumble straight into the studio for an all-day recording session. He need never leave the building...

Like me, Corbett caught Nils Petter-Molvaer's set at this year's Cheltenham Festival. The Norwegian trumpeter's band consisted of a turntable DJ, a laptop beat manipulator, a realtime sampler and an actual acoustic drummer. "I guess that's the way that I'd probably look to set my thing up," says Corbett. "But the thing Nils did was use his trumpet like an effects unit. My stuffs got a lot more melody there, to be played with the raw sound of the trumpet. I think if you're using effects, they are gimmicks. They just need using when the time's right, rather than all over the track."

Corbett operates a variety of composing strategies, sometimes adapting material that was penned for an acoustic line-up. "The 'Corbenova' track, I'll be doing with my new quartet, with more of a jazz vibe, which is how it was written."

At other times, Bryan will improvise over a set of programmed heats. "Certainly on the three tracks that I did in Amsterdam, with Roger Perks. He wrote a vibe, and I just put bits over the top. Roger's a good friend of mine. He used to live in Birmingham." Perks plays guitar, bass and keyboards, working from out of his own studio.

The main body of the new album was, of course, recorded at Ty's studio, in collaboration with Salt-uh and Levi French. Corbett's known both of these tech-orientated musicians for several years now. "Ty was always talking about having a studio. They had their own set-up down The Jewellery Quarter, and Ty spoke to them. Where my flat is, there's two spare rooms, so we moved the studio across. It was ideal for me to have a studio next door!"

Salt-uh and French are doing a fair amount of outside, commercial remix work, with Corbett's album being the first release on Ty's label. There are imminent plans for an album by Birmingham singer Sara Coleman, followed by a project front keyboardist Steve Sheriff.

Corbett has been playing at Ty's since it opened five years ago. "The club has yet to receive any funding, so it all comes out of Ty's pocket. I think it's had a massive impact on the jazz scene, and given a fresh lease of life to people. They've got something to work for."