Kai Hoffman

With rave reviews from her shows at the Blue Note Milano, the Elgar Room of the Royal Albert Hall and the European Jazz Expo, Kai Hoffman is a rising international star, and has been compared to legends like Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, and Sarah Vaughan. A resident performer at Europe’s oldest jazz club, Ronnie Scott’s, for over six years, “Kai is the whole package from head to toe”, according to Jazzwise Magazine, with her mixture of vintage jazz, cabaret and original material.

Sponsored by London-based vintage reproduction brand Vivien of Holloway, expat-American Kai Hoffman released her critically-acclaimed solo album ‘Do It While You Can’ at one of the world’s oldest jazz clubs, Ronnie Scott’s, in 2013. “Jazz forgets, all too often, the virtues of the entertaining and the joyful. Hoffman doesn’t.” (Bruce Lindsay, All About Jazz).

With two previous releases under her belt - ‘Hey Boy! Hey Girl!’ with Ray Gelato and the Giants (2011), and ‘Jump, Jive and Swing’ with Kai’s Cats (2010), “[Kai has] an infectious, cheeky, charm… a wicked ‘glint in the eye’ sense of humour when she performs that you can’t help yourself but get swept up in her performance. She makes you feel like she’s performing just to you, with her sexy, sultry ‘blonde bombshell’ looks that gives just a nod to the good old days…[Kai’s] vocals are stunning, sassy and explosive, yet soft and heartfelt” (Glenn MacNamara, London Jazz News).

Possessed of “…an insatiable joie-de-vivre rare in these cynical times” (Stephen Graham, Marlbank), Kai has been featured in print by The Evening Standard, Metro, The Stage, and Time Out, and has been interviewed on BBC Radio (Robert Elms, Joanne Good) and by BBC Ulster ‘Jazz Club’ host Walter Love (with an hour-long feature show about Kai and her music), as well as Jazz FM and numerous other local stations in the UK and abroad.

Having honed her craft hosting the monthly Live and Let Jive club night at Soho jazz institution Ronnie Scott’s since 2008 – deemed “London’s coolest hepcat hangout” by The Stage, and awarded Critic’s Choice by Time Out London – Kai is considered to be part of the Ronnie Scott’s family, an honour not afforded to many at this world-famous club.

Originally from Boston, Massachusetts, Kai is a versatile, vivacious performer, equally at home in a vast variety of venues ranging from the Elgar Room of the Royal Albert Hall to the Rome Rockabilly Festival, the Blue Note Milano to the Sheraton Hotel in Bangladesh. In his London Jazz News review of the ‘Do It While You Can’ album launch performance, Ray Gelato sums up Kai Hoffman brilliantly: “[Kai has] a great ability to sell whatever song she is singing, and put it across with bags of personality… using the richness of her voice to great effect, and also displaying fine pitch and great phrasing… One of the finest vocalists and performers around on the scene today.”