2016

Formanek Michael & Ensemble Kolossu: Distance [CD]

Avishai Cohen impressed a lot of listeners with his soulful contributions to Mark Turner's Lathe of Heaven album in 2014. Now the charismatic Tel Aviv-born trumpeter has his ECM leader debut in a programme of expansive and impressionistic compositions for jazz quartet (trumpet, piano, bass, drums), augmented by tenor saxophone on a few pieces. Into The Silence is dedicated to the memory of Avishai's father David, reflecting upon the last days of his life with grace and restraint. Avishai's tender muted trumpet sets the emotional tone of the music in the album's opening moments and his gifted cast of musicians explore its implications. Israeli pianist Yonathan Avishai has played with Cohen in many settings and solos creatively inside the trumpeter's haunting compositions, sometimes illuminating them with the phraseology of the blues. Cohen and drummer Nasheet Waits have a hypersensitive understanding and their interaction can, from moment to moment, recall the heyday of Miles Davis and Tony Williams or Don Cherry and Billy Higgins. Yet this music, while acknowledging inspirational sources, is very much of our time. Bassist Eric Revis, a cornerstone of the Branford Marsalis quartet for two decades, provides elegant support throughout. And saxophonist Bill McHenry, a subtle modernist who has worked with Paul Motian and Andrew Cyrille, shadows Cohen's lines with feeling. Into The Silence was recorded at Studios La Buissonne in the South of France in July 2015 and produced by Manfred Eicher.

Digipack

Digipack.<br/><br/>LINE UP<br/>Iiro Rantala / piano<br/>Victoria Tolstoy / vocals<br/>Ulf Wakenius / guitar<br/>Lars Danielsson / bass<br/>Morten Lund / drums<br/><br/>No other European jazz pianist has had such a formative influence in his field in recent years as the Swede Esbjörn Svensson, who died far too soon in 2008. In changing constellations, moods and interpretations, Iiro Rantala, Viktoria Tolstoy, Ulf Wakenius, Lars Danielsson and Morten Lund take on some of the best-known Svensson respectively e.s.t. works. And if the album title "Tears For Esbjörn" becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy upon hearing Svensson's most emotional piece "Love Is Real" nobody needs to be ashamed; neither for tears of sadness at the irreplaceable loss of Esbjörn Svensson, nor for tears of joy at the music he left us with.

"The colours of The ""Magical Forest"" glow in this remarkable recording which brings together Sinikka Langeland's Norwegian-Finnish-Swedish Starflowers quintet with the singers of the Trio Mediaeval. It's an inspired concept: the Trio Medi?val, with their affinity for folk music and their unique vocal blend, adapt themselves ideally to Sinikka's sound-world, which is once archaic, timeless and contemporary. The quintet members, all bandleaders in their own right, are amongst the most characterful players in Scandinavia today, and Sinikka sets them free to improvise around her cycle of songs, built upon myths and legends of the world tree. <br/>The ""Magical Forest"" was recorded at Oslo's Rainbow Studio in February 2015, and produced by Manfred Eicher."

Gustavsen Tord/Simin Tander: What was said 2016 [CD]

Kühn Joachim: Beauty & truth 2016 [Digipack / CD]