This was a unique, possibly historic, evening at the Spin. Trumpeter Harry Beckett is now 75 and far from sprightly; Chris Biscoe is 63, while Pat Thomas, Mark Doffman and Raf Mizraki trail behind by at least another decade. I took a black-and-white photograph of Beckett when he last played at the Spin, putting it back quite a few years, that shows the man’s elderly fingers holding the smooth brass of the trumpet. Now the fingers are gnarled and the hands shake visibly as they bring the mouthpiece to his lips. It’s an unnerving moment.

The trumpet is a punishing instrument. Maybe lips and metal will never quite make the journey and the rest of the band will have to rush in to fill the silence. But though the tone is a bit thin and the range limited, Harry Beckett can still create the miracle of music with the groove that one has come to expect from this man who has been part of the British jazz scene since the 1950s. He possesses faultless intonation and the ability to inject a simple phrase with drive and intensity. At the same time, Pat Thomas, on keyboards, a player renowned for his imagination and lightening responses, did a wonderful job of filling the gaps in Beckett’s solos, without in any way stealing the limelight from the trumpeter’s musical intentions.

Meanwhile, Chris Biscoe, on alto and soprano saxophone, played blistering solos with effortless grace. Most of the melodies were presented in a chopped and fragmented way, allowing for plenty of interplay between Biscoe and Thomas as in Monk’s Bemsha Swing, where the skeleton of the tune was traded between piano and sax in a way that can only come from experience. Biscoe can take a free, unrestrained approach, making him a good match for Thomas, always ready to move out of the harmonic boxes of standard jazz. Thomas played with a fine sense of balance between the restraints of structure and the looser reaches of free improvisation.

Behind these three, the Spin regulars – Mark Doffman, on drums and Raf Mizraki, bass – worked with the energy and precision that is such an important ingredient of this club’s success.