| Free playing, Danish composer Carl Nielsen’s “Oft Am I Glad”, tunes by Bill Evans and George Russell, a Norwegian hymn, contemporary composition by Ola Gjeilo, a Wolf Biermann protest song, Ariel Ramirez.’s folkloric “La Peregrinacion”, ... Wide-ranging repertoire has become a hallmark of Bobo Stenson albums. But it’s not just the eclecticism that is striking: Stenson, Jormin and Fält take these far-flung sources and make an organic, breathing music out of them ... Stenson, of course, has long been one of the greats of Scandinavian jazz, and an ECM artist since the first years of the label. But there is a balance of energies in this particular trio – clear-edged lyrical piano playing, rootedness and keen choice of notes from the bass, and detailed, textural drumming – that is especially satisfying. Recorded in Lugano in November and December 2011. |