  |
|
|
 |
|
CD |
| 4.499 Ft
|
|
| 1. | Paul Motian (1)
|
| 2. | Clouds Moving
|
| 3. | En If
|
| 4. | Some
|
| 5. | Something 'Bout Camels
|
| 6. | If
|
| 7. | Lanesboro
|
| 8. | Minnesota
|
| 9. | Nu
|
| 10. | Paul Motian (2)
|
Jazz / Jazz Instrument, Piano Jazz
Recorded February 2009
Anat Fort: piano
Gary Wang: double-bass
Roland Schneider: drums
"Anat Fort has a charming way of dispensing pastoralism and an insightful way of lining that pastoralism with depth", wrote Jim Macnie, in the Village Voice, adding that "her trio has the kind of poise that lets her move from terra firma to the stratosphere". In the Jewish Week, George Robinson observed that Fort "writes music that is a skillful mix of the romantic and the cerebral, like watching a flower open, an enthralling combination of geometry and color..." The Israeli pianist made a lot of friends with her widely-praised ECM debut "A Long Story" in 2007, and the new disc, with her regular working band, will make some more.
"Fort is a real discovery" - Francis Davis, Village Voice This is the second ECM album by Israeli pianist/composer Anat Fort. And If focuses attention on her trio with Gary Wang and Roland Schneider, which recently celebrated its tenth anniversary as a working band. With its musical emphasis on ballads and clearly delineated melodies, And Ifis an extremely attractive and highly-accessible recording. Since her ECM debut, Fort has started to develop a sizeable US following, sure to grow.
"And If" is the second ECM album from Anat Fort. Six years ago, the Israeli pianist set up a New York recording session with Perry Robinson, Ed Schuller and Paul Motian. Touched by the musical outcome, Motian recommended the project to Manfred Eicher and the recording was mixed and issued as the wryly-titled "A Long Story" on ECM in 2007. The album made a lot of new friends for Fort, was a modest ‘hit' in jazz terms, and caught the attention of the world's press. Nat Hentoff, in JazzTimes, praised Fort's unmistakable personal voice and a music that reflected both Jewish roots and the pianist's strong identification with jazz. In the Jewish Times, Geoffrey Himes wrote that "Anat Fort is not the first person to discover that you can understand your homeland from a distance in ways you never could while living there. But she has translated those insights into compositions and arrangements marking her as one of the most promising pianists in jazz." There was a general consensus that here was a jazz composer-pianist with a fresh vantage point from which to view the traditions. At times the listener might catch an echo, too, of Russian music or gypsy music in the lyrical sway of things - also part of Fort's heritage – ,not that there is anything schematic about her blend of influences. She is an intuitive musician firstly: "Whatever is different in my approach is not something that I planned to put there."
"And If" carries the Fort tale forward. Where "A Long Story" was essentially a production project, the new disc puts the focus on Anat's regular trio with Gary Wang and Roland Schneider, a group which recently celebrated its tenth anniversary as a working band. They have hundreds of concerts behind them, yet "And If" is the first recorded documentation of their trio playing.
Leader Anat Fort was born near Tel Aviv and studied classical piano as a child. Also improvising and writing her own tunes from an early age she naturally gravitated toward jazz, although her pieces were also steeped, from the outset, in the colours and atmospheres of the Middle East.
Formative influences included Bill Evans, Keith Jarrett and "very much of the music on ECM" which she heard first as a teenager in the late 1980s. In the mid-1990s she came to the USA to study jazz, wanting to balance a natural tendency towards freer playing with a proper understanding of the tradition. Her teachers have included jazz greats Rufus Reid and Harold Mabern.. She also studied briefly with Paul Bley . In the last several years she has become an influential figure on NYC's alternative jazz scene, but is also a highly regarded player in her homeland. She now splits her time between Israel and the US.
Bassist Gary Wang grew up in Boston and San Francisco, moving to New York in the late 1990s. As well as being Anat's bassist for a decade, he has played in the bands of T.S. Monk, Stanley Turrentine, Matt Wilson and many others.
Heidelberg-born drummer Roland Schneider moved from Germany to New York in 1991 to study with Billy Hart and Bill Stewart, amongst others. Now a much in-demand player on the international scene he has worked across the whole range of modern jazz, with musicians including Maynard Fergusson, Muhal Richard Abrams and Kenny Wheeler.
The new Anat Fort Trio album was recorded at Oslo's Rainbow Studio in February 2009. On "And If", themes and solos, written sections and improvisations flow seamlessly together in elegant and seemingly egoless jazz. Of her trio partners Wang and Schneider, Fort has said "They're both very naturally musical, very sensitive. They know how to leave space, which is very important for me."
A sense of space defines the collective improvising on "And If". While making a case for the trio as an autonomous force, with a programme of material all penned by Fort, the album also has some strong connections to its predecessor. Centrepiece of the new disc is "Something 'Bout Camels", a ten-minute reworking of one of the pieces from "A Long Story", now extended and with its theme emerging out of a patiently-developed, glistening web of interaction.
There are also two variations of a piece entitled "Paul Motian", saluting the drummer who made "A Long Story" possible: the piece's melody has some of the folk-like simplicity of Motian's tunes, and Schneider's freely-paddling brushes flesh out the portrait.
Anat Fort
Active Decades: '90s and '00s
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Avant-Garde Jazz, Jazz Instrument, Piano Jazz
Combining jazz and classical elements with hints of her Middle Eastern background, pianist and composer Anat Fort has shown an early ability to move easily in all of those musical worlds. Born in Israel, she began studying classical music at the age of five, and a lifelong fascination with improvisation led to her enrolling in the jazz program at William Paterson University in New Jersey. Following her graduation from the program in 1996, Fort moved to New York to study improvisation with Paul Bley and composition with Harold Seletsky. Her first album, the atmospheric Peel, appeared in 1999 from Orchard Records. A session recorded with drummer Paul Motian, bassist Ed Schuller, and clarinetist Perry Robinson in 2004 was eventually released in 2007 as A Long Story by ECM Records. An active composer and arranger, Fort continues to make her home in New York while touring with her Anat Fort Trio, which includes bassist Gary Wang and drummer Roland Schneider.
---Steve Leggett, All Music Guide |
|
CD bolt, zenei DVD, SACD, BLU-RAY lemez vásárlás és rendelés - Klasszikus zenei CD-k és DVD-különlegességek |  | | Webdesign - Forfour Design |
|
|
