Stephane Belmondo

Éric Legnini is a Belgian jazz pianist and leader of the Éric Legnini Trio. He started to play piano in the Stefano Di Battista Quartet. In the 1990s, he worked with Flavio Boltro (trumpet) and Stefano Di Battista (saxophone) forming the jazz ensemble Éric Legnini Trio that caught attention in the 1990s. He has played with fellow artists like Aldo Romano, Belmondo Quintet, John Ruocco, Félix Simtaine, Michel Hatzi, Dré Palemaerts, Emanuel Cisi, Toninho Horta, Philippe Catherine, Serge Reggiani, Hein van de Geyn, Marcia Maria, Jacques Pelzer, André Ceciarelli, Éric Le Lann, Paco Sery and others.

Gil Evans & Laurent Cugny - Big Band Lumiere - Rhythm a Ning (1987) {EmArcy 836 401-2}
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© 1987 EmArcy / PolyGram | 836 401-2
Jazz / Modern Big Band / Progressive Jazz / Contemporary Jazz

This is a very interesting recording. Aging arranger/pianist Gil Evans agreed after much persuasion to come to Paris and play his music at a few concerts with Laurent Cugny's Orchestra. After only one rehearsal, the first event took place, and it gratified Evans to realize that the young French musicians were not only excellent players but big Gil Evans fans. Their interpretations of Thelonious Monk's "Rhythm-A-Ning," "London" and "La Nevada" rank with the best versions of Evans's regular Monday Night Band, and Cugny's "Charlie Mingus' Sound of Love" (an answer to Mingus' "Duke Ellington's Sound of Love") is also excellent. Few of the sidemen, other than tenor-saxophonist Andy Sheppard and percussionist Marilyn Mazur, are known in the U.S., but they did an excellent job of bringing Gil Evans's music to life.

Gil Evans & Laurent Cugny Big Band Lumiere - Golden Hair (1989) {EmArcy 838 773-2}
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© 1989 EmArcy / PolyGram | 838 773-2
Jazz / Modern Big Band / Progressive Jazz / Post Bop / Contemporary Jazz

The second of two album to come out of the Nov 1987 sessions featuring the great Gil Evans with Laurent Cugny's Big Band Lumiere. The first album is RHYTHM-A-NING. Laurent Cugny was born in 1955, he is one of the best French jazz musician and known as a specialist of Gil Evans' music. Laurent wears two hats: he is, on one side, a musician and, on the other, a musicologist and a professor at the Paris-Sorbonne University. Self-taught musician, he started playing the piano when he was ten and played in amateur groups at the age of eighteen. He created several groups while he was studying economics and film studies. In 1979, he created the Big Band Lumiere and won the same year the third prize of piano at the National Jazz Competition in La Defense. In 1980, he also received prizes for its compositions and for the Big Band Lumiere.

Laurent Cugny & Orchestre National De Jazz - Yesternow (1994) {Verve 522 511-2} (Miles Davis related)
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© 1994 Verve / Phonogram-Polygram | 522 511-2
Jazz / Modern Big Band / Contemporary Jazz / Fusion

I'm very fond of Miles' '70s "electric" period, especially the dark, deep live albums he recorded during this time (namely Dark Magus and Agharta). This disc, which gives MD the big-band treatment, offers many pleasures of its own, although, for my money, neither Cugny nor anyone else (save maybe Bill Laswell) has ever reached the same primal place that Miles did during this time. Excellent album! This album is something special. Great atmosphere, 60 minutes of pure enjoying.

Laurent Cugny Big Band Lumiere - Santander (1991) {EmArcy 838 266-2}
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© 1991 EmArcy / Phonogram / PolyGram | 838 266-2
Jazz / Modern Big Band / Contemporary Jazz / Progressive Jazz

This is a sensational album that seemlessly merges big band conceptions with progressive electric instrumentation, without sacrificing any of the artistic values that can be found in either when in the right hands. This is absolutely a must own for anyone who appreciates sublimely crafted intelligently played music, and especially for anyone who appreciates jazz in the least, though pegging the project as jazz misses the point.

Philly-based vocalist Denise King was doing just fine with her late-blooming career as a lush, soulful interpreter of standards. Then she met French pianist-arranger-composer Olivier Hutman. They initially teamed a dozen years ago in Paris, but it was their delayed reunion in late 2009 that proved the catalyst for King’s advancement to a richer, more rewarding level of artistry. After a couple of European tours, King and Hutman united with bassist Daryl Hall, drummer Steve Williams and saxophonist Olivier Temime to record No Tricks.

“There are times,” says pianist Frank Woeste, “when I think how useful it would be to have a third hand.” That thought seems to encapsulate an important trait in Woeste's playing, namely his natural urge to arrange and to orchestrate at the piano, something which is evident right from the start of his album “Pocket Rhapsody.” Woeste is not just an exceptionally fine pianist and a gifted exponent of the Fender Rhodes, he also has a thorough understanding of his own creative process. If all art is about leaving an impression, then Woeste's mission is to etch a deep mark both as a player and as a composer. His debut as an artist on ACT, then, not only reveals a musician brimming with ideas, but also a fully-fledged composer and an extremely adept arranger. His trio with guitarist Ben Monder and drummer Justin Brown creates a sound which is orchestral in its scale and its impact. The intimacy of chamber music goes hand in hand here with the forward propulsion of a jazz trio, and with the power of a big band. In other words, the title “Pocket Rhapsody” gets it right.