Mike Figgis, the British film-maker and musician, dedicated this performance to the recently departed Elvin Jones and the soon-to-bedeparted Vortex - which closes at Stoke Newington on Monday after 20 years as one of the country's best-loved jazz venues.

Since the phenomenal polyrhythmic drummer Mark Mondesir was in the band for the evening, the Elvin Jones connection was secure. But if Figgis's choice of countryfiddle music and Bessie Smith blues seemed less obviously linked to the Vortex's history of experimentation, the music still managed to spring some surprises - not least the often private and pensive singer Christine Tobin turning into a blues preacher of stately power.

First up was Disorder at the Border, a fiddle/accordion/ guitar threesome including Figgis's former People Band partner Charlie Hart on violin and sometime Van Morrison accordionist Geraint Watkins. They rattled through an infectious collection of tersely harmonised songs before traditional Vortex serendipity was restored by proprietor David Mossman's speech.

Then came an initially stealthy and eventually explosive drum intro from Mondesir, ushering in some mid-tempo blues. Guitarist Rick Bolton played with frugal incisiveness, and alto saxophonist Peter King sustained the spirit of the blues while breaking its melody-dictating moulds - a liberating practice he pursued all night. Figgis, treading warily but phrasing tellingly, proved on trumpet that his sense of pace and drama isn't only exhibited behind a camera.

Figgis took to the electric guitar, and Tobin unfolded a Bessie Smith repertoire that included Young Woman Blues and Easy Come Easy Go Blues. Without sounding like that poignantly operatic voice caught in the grooves of crackling, 70-year-old records, Tobin nonetheless caught eerie echoes of Smith's candid, slow-burn power. King delivered a devastating, unaccompanied account of Lush Life that was hard to attribute to only one sax, and a jazzier feature distantly reminiscent of the Kind of Blue material brought sharp interventions from all the soloists, over Mondesir's and bassist Dave Whitford's buoyant support.