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Enrico Rava and Joe Lovano: two jazz greats live in Rome

Album review: Roma - Enrico Rava, Joe Lovano

Long, open-ended exercises that spread themselves unbuttoned across the stage of Rome's Auditorium Parco della Musica last November - that's the matter in hand on this delightful album from two veterans and their accomplices.

Music • 31 Oct 19

Exotic instrumentation: Ensemble Supersonus with Marco Ambrosini, second from right.

Marco Ambrosini/ Ensemble Supersonus - Resonances

The instrumentation on this curious album is in itself exotic, before we get to the music at all, featuring the Swedish nyckelharpa, the Estonian kannel, the square piano, harp and the all-important jew's harp .

Music Reviews • 16 Jul 19

Mathias Eick - textures of vibrancy and soul. (Pic Colin Eick)

Mathias Eick - Ravensburg

As trumpeter, vibraphonist, double bass player, guitarist and piano player, Mathias Eick has performed on over 100 albums. His latest album is an appealing, often stirring blend of lyrical tunes with nothing to frighten jazz-shy horses.

Music • 15 Mar 18

Barzakh, a rich, thoughful 1990 album out now on vinyl from ECM.

Anouar Brahem – Barzakh

On its release in 1990, Barzakh - the ECM label debut of Tunisian oud player Anouar Brahem - won many fans. ECM recently reissued the record on vinyl, but even on CD it is a very special record indeed.

Album Reviews • 06 Dec 17

Vijay Iyer: lots of colour, verve and vim with the Sextet

Vijay Iyer Sextet - Far From Over

Pianist Vijay Iyer can be cerebral and, well, challenging in smaller formats but perched midships on this sextet vessel, he is sailing loosely and expansively.

Music • 02 Sep 17

Benedikt Jahnel: mellifluous notes but tentatively mathematical (when needed)

Benedikt Jahnel Trio - The Invariant

Marking their 10th anniversary togeher, pianist Benedikt Jahnel, double bassist Antonio Miguel and drummer Owen Howard return with The Invariant. The trio has been The Invariant of the piece, "a constant in a transformational period," according to Jahnel.

Music Reviews • 20 Mar 17

Julia Hülsmann with drummer Heinrich Köbberling, left and bassist Marc Muellbauer, right: back from her travels and a sixth album for ECM just out

Julia Hülsmann Trio – Sooner and Later

German pianist Julia Hülsmann and her trio cover Radiohead and a tune heard in Kyrgyzstan from a 12-year old violinist, adapted for the new eleven-track album from the ECM veteran.

Music Reviews • 02 Mar 17

Towner: intelligence and depth but always through the conduit of a warm sensibility.

Ralph Towner - My Foolish Heart

Those rangy nylon strings - and two 12-string tunes- fan out their notes tenderly in the hands of one-time Oregon guitarist Ralph Towner on his latest album My Foolish Heart.

Music Reviews • 20 Feb 17

Mats Eilertsen's Rubicon: cool as a Scandinavian stream as the ice melts under sunny vibes . .

Mats Eilertsen – Rubicon

Dreamy, mellifluous and sometimes sun-dappled as Rob Waring's vibraphone and marimba dispense good vibes over the ensemble's appealing weave, Rubicon will draw you in and hold you.

Reviews • 08 Jan 17

Stockhausen (trumpet, flugelhorn) and Weber (piano) - shimmering, glacial warmth and instinctive sharing

Markus Stockhausen Florian Weber – Alba

No rush job here, as Stockhausen and Weber have been working together for the past six years as a duo before the release this year of Alba, their shimmering debut record.

Music Reviews • 13 Dec 16

Into the Silence - a love song to a father lurks in the deep heart's core of the recording.

Avishai Cohen - Into the Silence

The passing of Avishai Cohen’s father in 2014 has inspired wistful greatness on the Tel Aviv trumpeter's ECM debut.

Music Reviews • 24 May 16

Enrico Rava: Rumbustious rattle and hum, post-bebop energy - and lots of wistfulness too

Enrico Rava Quartet Wild Dance

Trumpeter Enrico Rava's latest record mixes his characteristically wistful note with rumbustious Hendrix-lite fusion from the Italian veteran and his quartet.

Music Reviews • 20 Oct 15

Elina Duni's Dallëndyshe: an intriguing marriage of modern, piano-led jazz with passionate Albanian folk song.

Elina Duni Quartet Dallëndyshe

An Albanian singer who was raised in Switzerland, Elina Duni teamed up over a decade ago with pianist Colin Vallon during music studies at the Hochschule der Kunste in Berne. Her second LP for ECM applies an open-ended jazz sensibility to Albanian song.

Music Reviews • 15 Jul 15

Giovanni Guidi: inspired improvisation from a poet of the piano keys

Giovanni Guidi Trio This is the Day

There is a sense of oceanic presence about the best of the pieces on Giovanni Guidi Trio's second album for the ECM label.

Music Reviews • 07 Jun 15

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