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Gregory Porter is a singer/songwriter. He’s also a big, stocky, bearded, middle-aged jazz singer who wears a balaclava to cover facial scars. One of the unlikeliest pop stars of the modern era, he’s thriving amongst jazz aficionados and millions of others who don’t think they like jazz. The 46-year-old’s success is a wonderful reminder that the most important organ when it comes to judging music should always be our ears. “Time and time again I hear people tell me they don’t like jazz but they like this,” smiles Porter. “I’ve got to break it to them, well, you do like jazz, you just have a different idea of what you think it is. The umbrella is so wide, it’s got room to shelter all kinds of wonderful.”

The man kick-started late, independently releasing his 2010 debut before following up with a major label album “Liquid Spirit” in 2013, which won a Grammy in America and became a crossover hit in the UK. His 2016 follow up, “Take Me to the Alley,” was the first jazz album to break the British top five this decade.

His Xmas release this year (2017) is an album of Nat King Cole standards. Available on 180 gm heavyweight vinyl, it’s one for the festive stocking. God only knows how I neglected those pieces of plastic with the whole in the middle for so long. Digitised music is soulless. Artists like Mr Porter should be heard through a top end vinyl system for that big, warm, dynamic sound.