Jazz Sabbath

Jazz Sabbath, a project led by British keyboardist Adam Wakeman, reimagines Black Sabbath’s repertoire as an instrumental trio from the UK. Born in the late 2010s, the project develops a language positioned between hard bop, modal jazz and 1960s swing, transforming heavy metal songs into themes for piano, bass and drums. Jazz Sabbath relies on a club aesthetic, with arrangements that emphasize improvisation and shifts in rhythm while retaining the recognizable frameworks of the original compositions. The 2020 album Jazz Sabbath captured several of these reinterpretations in the studio and was accompanied by a mockumentary presenting an alternative biography of the band, a central element of Jazz Sabbath’s identity. In 2022, Jazz Sabbath Vol. 2 extended this approach by broadening the range of adapted tracks. Onstage, Jazz Sabbath performs mainly in the UK and Europe, moving between festivals, jazz clubs and rock bookings, placing the trio in a hybrid space between metal culture and jazz audiences.