Vi er inne i en ny måned, og de fleste land i Europa åpner opp for mer levende musikk. Dette har ført til at vi stadig får flere og flere korona-utbrudd, så for oss som bruker tiden på åp anmelde, lytte til og være opptatt av den fascinerende musikken man mkaller jazz, er det om og gjøre å holde oss mest mulig innendørs med våre platesamlinger. Men vi har også vært ute for å oppleve hvor inspirerende og positivt det er, for både kropp og sjel, å samles med andre likesinnede og høre levende musikk. Men vi holder avstand, og prøver å ta vare på hverandre så godt det går i denne vanskelige tiden.
Og her er hva de europeiske jazzredaksjoner har lyttet mest til den senere tiden:

Axel Stinshoff, Jazz thing:
MAIK KRAHL QUARTET Fraction (Challenge Records)

Luca Vitali, Giornale della Musica:
JON HASSELL Di Seeing Through Sound (Pentimento Volume Two) (Ndeya Records)

Madli-Liis Parts, Muusika:
CHARLES TOLLIVER Connect (Gearbox Records)

Paweł Brodowski, Jazz Forum:
WŁODEK GULGOWSKI Beyond Infinity (Soliton)

Mike Flynn, Jazzwise:
TIGRAN HAMASYAN The Call Within (Nonesuch)

Anna Filipieva, Jazz.Ru:
LENNY SENDERSKY & MOON STRINGS Blues Mizrahi (Losen Records)

Jan Granlie, salt-peanuts.eu:
KENNY WARREN TRIO In The Heat (Whirlwind Recordings)

Christine Stephan, JAZZTHETIK:
SIGURD HOLE Lys/Mørke (Elvesang)

Viktor Bensusan, jazzdergisi.com:
ANT LAW Sleeper Wakes (Edition Records)

Henning Bolte, Written in Music:
BENJAMIN MOUSSAY Promontoire (ECM)

Magnus Nygren, JAZZ:
AMBROSE AKINMUSIRE On The Tender Spot of Every Calloused Moment (Blue Note)

Cim Meyer, Jazz Special:
MARIA SCHNEIDER ORCHESTRA Data Lords (ArtistShare)

Lars Mossefinn, Dag og tid:
WALDEMAR 4  The Buoy And The Sea (AMP Music & Records)

Matthieu Jouan, citizenjazz.com:
CHRISTIAN LILLINGER’S OPEN FORM FOR SOCIETY Live (Plaist Records)

Why did I choose –

Cim Meyer:
An exceptional amount of work has been put into this project by Maria Schneider – one of the most gifted big band composers and arrangers ever. So much music to dive into and so many views to consider. A corner stone in her oeuvre.

Matthieu Jouan:
The great project, made in and for the studio, was performed live at Jazzfest Berlin 2019. This circular stage covered with many instruments, heavy and highly tuned, was the place of an heathen ceremony, where drummer Lillinger was heart-beating the audience. This very composed and framed music was warmed and shoved by legion of keys (grand piano, upright piano, synth, keyboards) and blades (vibraphone, marimba). A must heard.

Magnus Nygren:
Strong in form, but also open for a lot of improvisation. The music of trumpeter and composer Ambrose Akinmusire is always complex, sometimes weird and contradictory but also tender, beautiful and sad. The new album On the Tender Spot of Every Calloused Moment is no exception.
The album is a dissection of black life in America. With titles like Blues (we measure the heart with a fist) and Reset (quiet victories & celebrated defeats) he brings his music into a devoted atmosphere and it’s all possible to sense both anger and love.

Henning Bolte:
Pianist Benjamin Moussay has a beautiful gift to just by two carefully set tones transport listeners fully into experiencing a deeper world layer of calmly roaming and astounding sensing. In short, he creates distance to the everyday outside business and simultaneously access to freed intimate sensing and contemplating our state of being.

While shades might wave in and inexorably darken the mental scenery evoked by his magic tone colors it also brightens in non-predictable ways. It is interweaving mystery and clarity where the real and the magic meet and illuminate each other.

It’s small pianistic gestures with meaningful halts, which give this carefully orchestrated music its deep reaching impact – a humble masterwork. This music trusts itself
and lets listeners find themselves, something needed in these disrupted days.

Paweł Brodowski:
“Beyond Infinity” is the long awaited newest album by Włodek Gulgowski, a Polish born, Swedish based veteran pianist and composer. The album features his intriguing original music, with classical, electronic and jazz elements, performed solo on acoustic piano and keyboards. The action is constantly moving forward, unfolding an ever-developing story built on pulsating rhythms, dynamic shifts, changing moods and colors.
Gulgowski first emerged in the early ’60s as a member of the legendary Zbigniew Namysłowski Quartet, with whom he toured Great Britain and recorded “Lola” (Decca), the first Polish jazz album released in the West (1964). He soon emigrated to Sweden, reuniting with Namysłowski in the next decade on two albums, „Pop Workshop 1” and „Pop Workshop 2”, the latter including Tony Williams on drums. In the mid-70s Gulgowski lived temporarily in New York, collaborating with, among others, Michał Urbaniak, Al Di Meola, Steve Gadd and Anthony Jackson.

Viktor Bensusan:
A brilliant album by a guitar genius for these isolated times…

Anna Filipieva:
Saxophonist Lenny Sendersky, based in Tel Aviv, Israel, recorded his newest album with Russian musicians in Lenny’s native St. Petersburg; the resulting tracks (eight originals and three standards, arranged in the jazz/classical crossover vein) were released on a Norwegian label; the beauty of today’s multicultural, polycentric world!