Erik Truffaz

After 500,000 albums sold all over the world, the genre-bending jazz bandleader Erik Truffaz returns, with a brand new album. With his immense experience in music and the perspective that comes with age, Erik handles the trumpet with the hands of a master, drawing his inspiration from the uninhabited, the unknown, and everything that escapes the collective psyche. Along with his handful of associates (Arthur Hnatek, Corboz Benoit, Marcello Giuliani), Erik has shaped his sound. Inspired by the stars aligning, they made their upcoming album "Lune Rouge" (Red Moon) with the aim of raising their music to a level worthy of science-fiction.

How ‘bout another film? After Rollin', here’s Truffaz again with Clap!, the second installment in his cinema stories, repeating the miracle of substituting his own images for those conjured up by the original soundtracks. Or, as director Bruno Nuyten puts it: “Beyond the memories of the films that are mentioned, Erik Truffaz’s interpretation opens the imagination to other films that have never been made”. Nicely put.

Erik Truffaz received an early introduction into the world of a professional musician, thanks to his saxophone-playing dad. When he was ten years old, the French trumpeter began performing in his father's dance band. As he grew older, Truffaz performed with other bands in the region until he was 16 and heard Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. The great jazz trumpeter's music inspired him to learn more, and he set off for Switzerland's Geneva Conservatoire, where he became a student. Truffaz's repertoire expanded to works by Mozart and Verdi, and he performed as part of L'Orchestre de Suisse Romande. He also played in cover bands before establishing a group called Orange. The band concentrated on Truffaz's compositions. Among its members was Marc Erbetta, a drummer who continued to play with Truffaz as the trumpeter evolved…

French trumpeter Erik Truffaz has been a mover and shaker on the European creative improvisational scene since the mid-'90s. With the release of The Mask (a compilation of three previously released recordings: Out of a Dream, The Dawn, and Bending New Corners), Revisité (a DJ dance remix of The Mask), and 2002's forward-sounding Mantis, Truffaz became one of the most popular electronic jazz trumpeters to hit North America since Norwegian trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer charged forth with Khmer and Solid Ether. With the release of The Walk of the Giant Turtle, Truffaz and his quartet continue to make their mark as an improvisationally rich, high-energy groove experience. The two-part dance track "Scody" features the trumpeter coolly blowing around fluid trance grooves that flow as a mellow confluence of drum'n'bass rhythms and muted electric trumpet.

Eric Truffaz has covered a lot of ground - both literally and metaphorically - since releasing his first album on the Blue Note label in 1996. Recorded in several locations but cut to sound like a single concert, Face-a-Face reveals the success of this artist who, with consistency and determination, has travelled a long road to success that has been filled with detours, long stretches in the fast lane and occasional pit stops, but which has never veered away from the source of his originality and the happiness of his waking dream. For Truffaz, each concert is a chance to meet his public "face à face". And it's this exchange between musicians and their audiences - the source of his inspiration - that Truffaz has set out to recreate in venues across the world (a point he makes between two tracks on the album) from Mexico, Saint Petersburg and Madrid to Bombay, Lausanne, and Paris.

"Mexico" is the result of an exciting collaboration between Mexican electronic artist Murcof and Swiss born French trumpet player Erik Truffaz.
Truffaz, an improvisational jazz trumpeter and Murcof, a glitchy, classically influenced ambient laptop artist are an interesting pairing to begin with. Rather than structuring each piece in a completely democratic format, Truffaz and Murcof seem to take a jazz-like approach; playing off each other and allowing each other to dominate at the appropriate places. Opener "Al Mediodia" bears the most resemblance to traditional jazz and is based on a simple, syncopated percussion track which Murcof augments with repetitive, glitchy samples here and there…

There was a generation or two of trumpeters who picked up ideas from the meteoric musical trajectory of Miles Davis and developed them after Miles himself had moved on. Palle Mikkelborg and Enrico Rava are good examples, but the Swiss-born Frenchman Érik Truffaz is one of the most consistently creative. He just can’t help sounding beautiful and lyrical, whatever the setting. A good example here is his work on the slightly grungy sound of vocalist Anna Aaron’s song Blue Movie, which has a delightful, whimsical trumpet solo with Harmon mute that could have sprung out of any Davis recording from the 50s or 60s. As on many recent Truffaz discs, regular partners join the trumpeter: namely Marcello Giuliani on bass and drummer Marc Erbetta…

An odd reissue of sorts, Bending New Corners combines tracks off two of trumpeter Erik Truffaz's previous albums. It is unclear why Blue Note felt the need to repackage these tracks yet again; however, here they are and they are worth a listen. Containing tracks from the sessions that produced The Mask and its European version, The Dream, Bending New Corners is a groove-oriented work that draws heavily on late-'60s and early-'70s Miles Davis.

French trumpeter Erik Truffaz has been a mover and shaker on the European creative improvisational scene since the mid-'90s. With the release of The Mask (a compilation of three previously released recordings: Out of a Dream, The Dawn, and Bending New Corners), Revisité (a DJ dance remix of The Mask), and 2002's forward-sounding Mantis, Truffaz became one of the most popular electronic jazz trumpeters to hit North America since Norwegian trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer charged forth with Khmer and Solid Ether. With the release of The Walk of the Giant Turtle, Truffaz and his quartet continue to make their mark as an improvisationally rich, high-energy groove experience. The two-part dance track "Scody" features the trumpeter coolly blowing around fluid trance grooves that flow as a mellow confluence of drum'n'bass rhythms and muted electric trumpet.