Her piano playing is as direct as her singing: nothing held back, whatever the song demands. At Googlies, her husband Roger Carey joins her on bass. Few singers make a room feel this close.

Expect a tenor sound with history behind every note, from a regular who knows this room as well as any stage in Soho.

The trumpet cuts through a room; the flugelhorn, with its wider bore and rounder tone, pulls the room in close. Expect him to move between the two all night, matching the horn to the mood of the tune. He is a rising talent, and Googlies got there early: this is far from his first Thursday night gig at Botany Bay.

The 2023 Parliamentary Jazz Awards shortlisted him for Instrumentalist of the Year, and he now plays a tenor saxophone with a history of its own: it reputedly belonged first to Hank Mobley, then to Ronnie Scott, before it found its way to Art. Six decades on, and many Thursdays into his history with Googlies, he shows no sign of picking a side.

Expect a set built on space and swing rather than showmanship, from a player Googlies keeps inviting back for good reason.

Paul Wood came to singing early, and it gave him a range that few can match: a delicate ballad one moment, a rhythmic swing tune the next, without ever seeming to change gears.

Allison held the flute chair in the National Youth Jazz Orchestra in the late 1990s, though it is her alto sound that has carried her career since, alongside stages shared with Duke Ellington's one-time vocalist Adelaide Hall and West Coast legend Bud Shank. Googlies has hosted Allison before, and each time she has left the room a little "cooler" than she found it.

Nigel Price has made more than five hundred appearances at Ronnie Scott's, his organ trio won the Parliamentary Jazz Award for Best Jazz Ensemble in 2010, and he has backed Van Morrison and supported Gladys Knight at the Royal Albert Hall. This is not his first Thursday at Googlies, and he closes our August line up knowing why rooms like it matter.