Gabriel Zucker & Attila Gyárfás Cadences

September 22, 2017 is the release date for Harvesting Minds, Italian trombonist Filippo Vignato’s debut album as leader on the CAM JAZZ label. After his first album, Plastic Breath (Auand, 2016), and being nominated “Best New Talent” in 2016 by the Musica Jazz magazine’s prestigious Top Jazz index, Vignato brings together some of the most influential young European musicians for a new, fully acoustic quartet: Giovanni Guidi on piano, Mattia Magatelli on double bass and Attila Gyárfás on drums. The electric atmospheres of his debut album are only apparently distant from the dry sounds of Harvesting Minds: in the passage between these two works emerge the sharp musical vision and the personality of Vignato that, together with his uncommon talent for composing, trace a coherent and evolving path.

I think, if one had the chance to listen to a performance of the Gyárfás István Trio and his fellow musicians, he or she will become richer in their soul.

Bonaventura Aliotti‚ unrepresented in the CD catalogues until now‚ was a Sicilian composer of the middle Baroque‚ born in Palermo around 1640‚ dying some 50 years later. A Minorite friar‚ he worked as organist in Padua and various other Italian cities‚ ending up as maestro di cappella in Palermo. His oratorios‚ of which only four survive‚ seem to have been greatly admired in his time. Il Sansone‚ first performed in Naples in 1686‚ tells the central part of the familiar story of Samson – his seduction and betrayal by Delilah‚ at the bidding of the Philistine Captain and with the help of the allegorical character Inganno (‘Treachery’) and Morpheus‚ god of sleep. It was revised two years later for performance in Modena‚ and the choral music was added; the Modena score‚ as the only surviving source for the work‚ is used here.

For many listeners, the keyboard works of Gabriel Fauré epitomize French music of the fin de siècle, typically because its languorous melodies and subtle harmonies are at times evocative of late Romantic parlor music. Yet Angela Hewitt defends Fauré's piano music from such a superficial judgment, demonstrating that it is much more substantial in content than the conventional piano pieces of the time, and that the difficulties one encounters in his music are akin to the complexities in Bach. Hewitt's polished performances of the Thème et variations, two Valses-caprices, three Nocturnes, and the Ballade are proof of her longtime commitment to this music, and her penetrating insights into Fauré's expressions and technical artistry reveal levels of inventiveness that are often missed in less competent performances. Of course, having played Fauré for most of her life, Hewitt has intimate knowledge of the music, and her sensitivity and control communicate precisely the effects she wishes, so the music never seems sloppily sentimental or vaguely sketched.