Colours is the fifth album of Italian drummer-composer-educator-mentor Cecilia Sanchietti, who divides her time between Sweden and Italy, and her second one with a Swedish band, following Postcards from Gamla Stan (Blu Jazz, 2021). The new Swedish quintet features reed player Albero Pinton, Italian-Swedish guitarist Lutte Berg (aka Luciano Scalercio), pianist Adam Forkelid, double bass players Mauritz Agnas and Pär-Ola Landin, and Sanchietti on the drums.

Like Postcards from Gamla Stan, the new album extends the musical path previously built and suggests a unique blend of Reserved and thoughtful Nordic jazz, close to the ECM school, with a more open and romantic, sensual sensibility of Italian jazz. The seven pieces are titled by colors and each one imagines or reflects on a distinct and intimate kind of emotion, mood and energy, in a similar manner to how previous albums of Sanchietti were dedicated to courage and kindness.

The atmosphere of Colours is relaxed and emphatic. Sanchietti is a generous bandleader who offers enough space for her musicians and knows how to color her compositions with seductive rhythmic patterns and gentle touches. Berg pushes the dynamics of the quintet into athletic fusion terrains but Pinton and Forkelid, with their elegant solos and melodic articulation (check the beautiful ballad «Argento»), as well as the well-coordinated rhythm section of Sanchietti, Agnas and Landin (check the sensual «Ocra (Amagambo)». This album asks the listeners to contemplate their favorite colors and mirror these insights with Sanchietti’s moving suggestions.

Eyal Hareuveni

Cecilia Sanchietti (drums), Alberto Pinton (tenor saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet, flute), Lutte Berg (electric guitar), Adam Forkelid (piano), Mauritz Agnas (double bass), Pär-Ola Landin (double bass)