You can either have a quick growing hedge or you can have a low maintenance one.

Having said that, of my various hedges, I find the laurel one (which is quick) the easiest to maintain. (Of the various things called laurel, I think it is the usual one, ie, prunus laurocerasus.) This is because although it is quick growing, the new shoots stay soft for some time, so the hedge clippers go through like butter. Provided of course one trims it regularly. Let it go, and you'll have an all day job with a hand-saw to get it back to size. When I moved to the house, it was 7 feet tall and 8 feet thick. It was a big job, but we have reduced it to 3 feet tall and 1 foot thick, and we are having no difficulty keeping it at that size for at least 5 years. It usually needs two trims a year, once in late spring and again at the end of the summer, which tidies it up for the winter.