Tingvall Trio

My Top 5 Jazz Albums of 2017

Following my Top 5 Classical Albums of 2017 published some days ago, let me now write about my favorite Jazz albums.

2017 hasn’t been particularly impressive for me in terms of quantity of new Jazz albums that I really loved. I found myself more and more writing about classical music, or older recordings.

Not sure if this reflects a general slowdown of new Jazz releases or simply that my taste is rather particular. In any case, I also checked for reference some of the other top 2017 lists for Jazz, and didn’t find anything particularly exciting that I had missed.

But maybe you disagree? Let me know?

So here we go, here is my list for 2017. Note that while my Top 5 Classical list only had 5 star ratings, I also had to include two 4 star albums in here, just to make the numbers.

If you’ve been following my blog for a bit, you won’t be surprised to see a large number of piano trio albums here, my favorite genre.

You’ll find download links to each album in the original reviews of the albums that are linked.

Cecile McLorin Salvant: Dreams and Daggers

Cecile McLorin Salvant Dreams and Daggers 24 96 MackAvenue 2017

Well, let’s start strong anyhow: I’ve already postulated early on that Cécile McLorin Salvant could be the THE Jazz singer of the 21st century. It didn’t take rocket science nor a truffle dog to find this, in spite of her young age, she’s received praise from all over the world, including a Grammy nomination in 2014.

Dreams and Daggers is another masterpiece, with a nice mix of standards and originals, and a must have for any Jazz lover.

You´ll find my original review here.

Helge Lien: Guzuguzu

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I’ve been a great fan of Helge Lien for years, since I discovered Hello Troll. Guzuguzu really confirms that he’s one of the most talented Jazz trio artists out there. As I wrote in my review, it combines “Scandinavian lyricism combined with often extremely complex rhythms”. I think there´s nothing much to add here.

See my original review here.

Triosence: Hidden Beauty

Triosence: Hidden Beauty (24/96) Okeh 2017

Don’t get deterred by the cover art. Germany´s Triosence is one of the stars of Jazz trio based heavily on beautiful melodies and harmonies. Some would argue this is not Jazz, I don’t even bother to argue, as I simply like it very much.

You’ll find my original review here.

Tingvall Trio: Cirklar

Tingvall Trio Cirklar 24/96 2017 Skip Records

Tingvall Trio is another German group if you count there home base in Hamburg, but actually are much more international if you look at the members of the trio.

Cirklar is very good, if not their best album ever, but if you like their style (and they have a very strong regional following), you should really check this out.

You’ll find my original review here.

Shai Maestro Live at Moods

Shai Maestro on piano live at Moods March 17, 2017 (c) Musicophile — Shai Maestro Live At Moods March 17, 2017 (c) Musicophile)

My last album actually isn’t an album at all. It is the captured videostream of an outstanding concert I attended this March at Moods Zurich, the best Jazz club in town.

You’ll find my original writeup of Shai Maestro´s concert here, and it was truly an outstanding concert.

But for once, you don’t have to take my word for it. Moods has recently installed what they call Moods.digital, basically a platform video streaming and archiving all concerts at Moods.

And I was really lucky, the technology just went live shortly before this concert. So with a subscription fee (you can cancel anytime if you don’t like it) you can now watch the entire back catalog of recorded concerts at moods with outstanding video and very good audio quality. Check out my article about it here. And no, I’m not getting sponsored for writing this.

What do you think?

My list is obviously very biased, very personal, but such is my entire blog.

Did I miss anything? I´d very much like to hear about your personal favorites for 2017.

Tingvall Trio’s New Album Cirklar – A Review

When I started this post, I was suprised to notice that I hadn’t written a single post on this trio yet. I kind of assumed I had. But my search function told me otherwise.

Martin Tingvall’s Hamburg, Germany-based piano trio is a pretty international affair. Tingvall himself is Swedish, his Bass player Omar Rodriguez Calvo is Cuban, only the drummer is German.

They have a pretty strong following in Germany, but start to get better known beyond the borders.

Let me open a parenthesis here: I’m still surprised that Jazz is a very regional affair. You’d think that in the days of the internet any artist can be heard and known everywhere. And especially in a niche area like Jazz people wouldn’t really care where an artist comes from. But then again, quite often I see artists available due to some weird label rights in Europe, but not in the US, or vice versa.

Probably it boils down to the fact that album sales really don’t matter that much any more these days, and concerts are the main way a Jazz artists gets to their audience these days. And concerts quite often remain a very local affair. Great artists like Triosence for example rarely venture out of their native Germany. Parenthesis closed.

Tingvalls albums in the past have been very consistent, weird-sounding (to non Swedish ears) Scandinavian names like Vägen, Vattensaga, or Norr, and also have followed a certain style.

Tingvall Trio: Cirklar (Skip Records 2017)

Tingvall Trio Cirklar 24/96 2017 Skip Records

The latest album keeps this consistency. A weird name (that the booklet doesn´t bother explaining), and a very Tingvall-like Scandinavian-inspired jazz.

If you´ve followed my blog for a bit you know which kind of style I like in piano trio. Basically either the Oscar-Peterson swinging and grooving style, or the more melodic approach.

Tingvall clearly is the latter. They do groove up to a point in the faster tracks, but the real beauty is revealed in the slow tracks, that evolve into always interesting melodic and harmonic developments.

Track 4, Black Molnen is a perfect example of this, the type of ballad I just love.

Some may ask: but where is the Jazz in that? And I agree, this music is probably borderline in that respect. But to me, the melodic and harmonic beauty is just what I’m looking for.

As mentioned above, faster tracks on this album don´t always work for me. Track 5, Skansk Blues, is too much of a regular blues to be attractive. Blues obviously live from simplicity, but here the recipe just gets a bit too repetitive.

The title track, another ballad, then again gives me exactly what I want from Tingvall. If you like this track, buy the album.

That’s not to say that I only like the slow tracks on this album. Tidlös for example is a very groove uptempo track that has just the right amount of creativity. And Bumerang (See clip above) is quite well done, too.

Finally, Elis Visar really gives you the feeling of an open Nordic landscape.

Overall, really worth checking out.

My rating: 4 stars

You can find it here (Qobuz) and here (Prostudiomasters)