Stefano Mini

Enrico Rava - Renaissance (2002) {Venus Japan Mini-LP VHCD-78161 rel 2010}
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© 2002, 2010 Venus Records Japan | VHCD-78161
Jazz / Contemporary Jazz / Post Bop / Trumpet

Enrico Rava plays both trumpet and flugelhorn on this sweet-sounding date from recent years – a set that's a great reminder of his talents as a straight jazz artist, amidst some other records that have a more texture-based approach! The group's a quartet – with Stefano Bollani on piano, Rosario Bonaccorso on bass, and Roberto Gatto on drums – an Italian combo that swings nicely.

3Quietmen is a young Italian trio that draws inspiration from composer Bela Bartok's Mikrokosmos, a prominent work consisting of 153 piano pieces. Fellow countryman and revered modern jazz pianist Stefano Battaglia joins the band for these pieces that waver between jazz and groove-based abstractions, shaded with electronics. It's a polytonal feast for the ears, as the musicians execute circular mini-motifs and cunning paradigm shifts, punchy ostinatos and brawny group-centric interplay. Battaglia occasionally calms the waters via airy, jazz-based phrasings and swirling chord progressions, while offering counterpoint to trumpeter Ramon Moro's searing notes. The classical inferences are subliminal and faint, and the artists occasionally skirt the free zone. On "Quietman Hymn," Battaglia and Moro render a supple and memorably melodic theme atop the rhythm section's gentle pulse and accenting tonalities.

Pianists and guitarists don't always mix well,"" Eric Legnini says. There can even be a kind of competition in the air between these two instrument worlds, these two mini orchestras on their own, these two popular technical tools that everyone has tasted at one time or another. However, it is far from being his case, says the Belgian: on his side, relations are rather good - even if, he confesses in a loud laugh, that he is only a ""poor guitarist"" who can only play ""three poor Brazilian chords"". But it must be said that the native of Huy (near Liege) grew up with a father who was a fan of Django Reinhardt: ""there were always some that resonated in the house"", he recalls. And then, along the way, Eric Legnini met some of the best specimens of the genus.