Thomas Enhco, Vassilena Serafimova [funambules

Thomas Enhco is a legend in his home country France. The twenty-something pianist belongs to a group of innovative and very daring musicians. Didier Lockwood discovered Enhco when he was just nine years old and already a promising violinist.

Thomas Enhco is a legend in his home country France. The twenty-something pianist belongs to a group of innovative and very daring musicians. Didier Lockwood discovered Enhco when he was just nine years old and already a promising violinist. Shortly thereafter Enhco started playing the piano, too. When he was 18 the Parisian debuted with his album Esquisse, sponsored by master drummer Peter Erskine. It was apparent that in his compositions Enhco looks to make clear connections with classical music. The album was followed by Someday My Prince Will Come and Fireflies; two powerful albums yet again, and in between he wrote the score for the movie Les Cinq Parties Du Monde and recorded a CD with drummer Jack DeJohnette and bassist John Patitucci. Enhco’s lyrical way of playing the piano and ability to improvise are particularly remarkable.

Neither too nationalist nor too internationalist, this 1995 recording of Béla Bartók's two violin concertos featuring Thomas Zehetmair with Ivan Fischer leading the Budapest Festival Orchestra is just right. Austrian-born Zehetmair has a fabulous technique, a warm but focused tone, and lively sense of rhythm, all of which make him an ideal Bartók player. His interpretations are less about showing off then about digging in, and his performances are more about the music than they are about the musician. Hungarian conductor Fischer and his Hungarian orchestra are not only up for the music in a technical sense, they are also down with the music in an emotional sense, and their accompaniments ground Zehetmair's coolly flamboyant performances. Captured in white-hot sound that is almost too vivid for its own good, these performances deserve to stand among the finest ever recorded.

On Blues Is a Feeling, the late guitarist-vocalist Jesse Thomas delivers straightforward, rural-sounding blues in an intimate, drumless session from 1992 with pianist Jodie Christian and second guitarist John Primer. Thomas was 81 years old at the time of this recording, just three years before his death. And though his voice sounds somewhat frail here-and probably would’ve been overwhelmed by the sound of drums-Primer and Christian provide light, elegant accompaniment that puts Thomas’ soft yet expressive vocals in the foreground. And Thomas proves to be a humorous storyteller on tunes like “Married Woman Blues,” “She Throwed Me Clothes Outdoor” and “Santa Claus.”