The new album of Italian-Swedish reeds master Alberto Pinton new sextet radiates an uplifting sense of familiarity, that in its turn charges the music with a fresh kind of urgency. Pinton joins forces for the first time with his daughter, vocalist Selma Pinton, who employs her innocent, ethereal vocals also as a colorful instrument. The sextet, Alberto Pinton Sestetto Contemporaneo (AP6C), is an extension of Pinton’s Trio (who released last year the «RÖD» album) and relies on the Trio’s rhythm section – bass player Vilhelm Bromander and drummer Konard Agnas (the latter also played in Pinton’s Noi Siamo quartet). Trombonist Mats Äleklint and vibes player Mattias Ståhl who round the AP6C were original members of Pinton’s Quintet that was active in the last decade.
Pinton says that the compositions for the AP6C came about as a spur of the moment decision to present this sextet at his home base, the Glenn Miller Café in Stockholm in November 2017. Pinton composed all the pieces and recorded them in September 2018, after one more live performance, using Äleklint as the sound engineer, and released the AP6C debut album on his newly-founded Clear Now Records. These pieces reflect his quiet and wise leadership, his impressive orchestral ideas, drawing from his experience as a member of the Swedish Bohuslän Big Band and Ann-Sofi Söderqvist Jazz Orchestra, and, obviously, his total control of different woodwind instruments.
Pinton wanted to create a loose structure of «unintentional suite in a live situation», leaving complete freedom of interpretation and solo length to the musicians. He believes that “the less instructions, the better the music’. And he was absolutely right. You can’t miss with these kind of musicians, all focusing on serving the music and pushing it further and deeper. Pinton is obviously the natural leader with his powerful, big horn sound when he plays the baritone sax or the clarinets or a sensual playfulness when he alternates with the flutes, but he is also a generous, democratic leader. Äleklint, Ståhl, Bromander, Agnas, Selma Pinton and Pinton himself shine on the subtle drama of «Leaps», the film-noir title-piece, the quiet and melancholic «Short Stories #1 & #2» the sparse, collective improvisation «Il Tempo Intanto Correva», the emotional post-bop-ish chants of «Il Deserto dei Tartari» or the light, almost transparent gentleness of «Twelve».
Run for it. You will take Pinton and AP6C many times later.
Eyal Hareuveni
Alberto Pinton (bs, cl, bcl, piccolo, bfl), Selma Pinton (v), Mats Äleklint (tb), Mattias Ståhl (vib), Vilhelm Bromander (b), Konrad Agnas (dr)
