de Chassy

'Classical and jazz music are my two'musical lands that I ve been striding along the boundaries for a long time. The Concerto for piano in which the soloist improvises beside a symphony orchestra represents a decisive step in my career. This album is dedicated to the pianist Brigitte Engerer with whom I had the honour to collaborate with for 4 years and who remains a living source of inspiration and enthusiasm.' Guillaume de Chassy After 9 albums to his credit, Traversées is the first symphonic album of Guillaume de Chassy. Recorded in the mythical studio La Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland, it s composed of two parts…

Pianist Guillaume de Chassy insists that Silences is inspired by the example of clarinetist Jimmy Giuffre's late-1950s trio recordings. To be sure, like those records, this album is marked by intimacy and introspection, a strong clarinet sound and no drummer. But Silences, recorded at a French abbey, doesn't sound much like Giuffre's records—nor indeed, like much of jazz, at first blush. It's not at first clear just what this piano-clarinet-bass formation is up to. The helpfully titled "Birth of a Trio" provides clues. It shows just how much this music shares with jazz—improvisation, first of all; and empathy, the musicians listening closely to each other, as for example when de Chassy's piano sidles up to Thomas Savy's soaring clarinet.

Faraway So Close is a trio offering from pianist Guillaume de Chassy, whose previous recording, Piano Solo (Bee Jazz, 2007), was completely engrossing in its trenchant beauty. This album projects the same depth, sincerity and directness of communication as the former one, but in a trio setting. Music is mysterious in the manner in which its affects are felt. The piano, with its mechanical action, adds a further layer to the puzzle, as Jon Balke made clear on Book of Velocities (ECM, 2008). De Chassy's keyboard touch is remarkable for its liquid clarity and supports his seeming endless supply of ideas, both melodic and harmonic.