corto.alto are making jazz cool again

Liam Shortall is a rising star in the UK jazz scene — and one in danger of making the genre ‘cool’ again with his music project, corto.alto. Jazz isn’t something that necessarily captivates today’s generation, but somehow corto.alto has by bringing jazz back down to earth, freshening it up with the addition of electronic sounds and adding some new-wave improvisation to create something, you might say, out of this world. Those who are already fans of the snappy, toe-tapping, soul-shaking music genre may disagree — jazz has always been cool. And they’re right. But when someone as young and Glasgow-hip as Liam Shortall (hence the bands’ name, corto.alto, i.e. ‘short.tall’, decoded from music lingo) sweeps into the scene, jazz suddenly takes on a level of street cred it didn’t have before. 

A perfect representation of this was corto.alto’s SXSW showcase performance last month in Austin, Texas. The band played their set in a mix of football jerseys and Texas hold-em hats, perfectly living up to the description of “traditional jazz heads raised in the age of the internet”. Originally, though, Liam hails far from Texas in Dumfries, Scotland and, since debuting corto.alto in 2020, has travelled the world performing and taking home major awards including Best Album and Best Band in the 2020 Scottish Jazz Awards. And now, the project is nominated for UK Jazz Act of the Year at the 2025 Jazz FM Awards for their fresh take on contemporary jazz music.

We caught up with him ahead of the awards to see how he’s feeling about the nomination, competing for the top prize against names like Nubya Garcia and Ezra Collective.

Camille Bavera: How does your music and your sound compare to the other nominees in your category for the 2025 Jazz FM awards (Ezra Collective and Nubya Garcia)?  

Liam Shortall: I suppose every artist’s music comes from a place of different experience and influences, so I’m not going to make comparisons. I’ve been listening to both Nubya and Ezra’s music for years and have huge artistic respect for them, so it’s really an honour to be on this shortlist beside them. 

CB: Between your Jazz FM nomination and the Mercury Prize last year, you’ve levelled up quite a lot in the last year in the public eye. What do you think has made you grow so much in this period? And what do you consider your most fulfilling accomplishment to date?  

LS: Over the last eighteen months we’ve done way over a hundred shows and released almost fifty tracks. I love releasing music and performing live, and it’s been super nice to see the project grow and more people getting something from the music. I’d say the most fulfilling achievement to me is being able to travel to new places playing my music with my best friends. It’s always so amazing playing shows in cities you’ve never played before and people showing up. 

CB: Noting your Spanish ancestry, but predominantly Scottish heritage, how do those work together to form your sound? 

LS: I actually wouldn’t say my sound is directly influenced by my Spanish or Scottish (or Welsh, or Irish) heritage. I listen to so many different genres of music and I suppose my influences are really broad, and I really try not to shut myself off to anything new. My music is definitely most influenced by Black American music like Jazz, HipHop, Soul, Funk, etc. and I suppose more recently Dance genres like Jungle and Breakbeat.

CB: What’s the jazz scene like in Glasgow? And what are the predominant musical influences in Scotland?

LS: The jazz scene in Glasgow as a whole is amazing. It’s super encouraging and supportive. It’s also quite close knit and everyone kind of knows each other. There’s such a diverse range of sound within the ‘Jazz’ bracket too, which is probably my favourite thing about making music in Glasgow.  

CB:  What’s something that you’re seeing a resurgence of in music right now? And what’s one thing that you want to see make a comeback? 

 LS: I think it’s been cool to see instrumental music as a whole grow in the past few years, Jazz included. I always felt like instrumental music has the power to mean more in a strange way, to me anyway. And I think that’s one of the reasons people are gravitating to Jazz and other predominantly instrumental genres more. I’d like to see Ska make a big comeback — big up Ska!

CB: When you think of someone listening to your newest album, how do you picture them listening to it? Headphones, jazz club…?

LS: With their pals, hopefully.

corto.alto is nominated at this year’s Jazz FM Awards (jazzfmawards.com) including UK Jazz Act of the Year and performs at Love Supreme Jazz Festival on Sunday 6 July (lovesupremefestival.com).