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| MPS Records: New Jazz Trio - Page One / Page Two - digital release (May 19th, 2017) in 1970, three of Europe's leading first-wave Avant-gardists united to form the New Jazz Trio. They personified the evolution of modern jazz into the realm of a freer more exploratory direction. German trumpeter Manfred Schoof felt at home with the exquisite simplicity of Mal Waldron as well as the cyclonic free play of Peter Brötzmann, maneuvered through the mainstream jazz currents of the Kenny Clarke/Francy Boland Big Band and the outré experimentation of The Global Unity Orchestra. German bassist Peter Trunk and Dutch drummer Cees See were like musical freethinkers. Trunk, especially, was lauded by his peers. Guitarist Attila Zoller stated that he was "as good as any of the best American bassists", and German jazz guru Joachim Ernst Berendt called Trunk "the best bassist in German jazz." Unfortunately, Trunk died in 1973, but this and MPS companion album, Page Two, chronicle the trio's seminal music New Jazz Trio - Page One //1970 On Page One spontaneity is the name of the game, but within the freedom there is a continual sense of form, melody, and swing. For the three, improvisation is a method of spontaneous composition. Themes appear, unconstrained, morph, return transfigured. Each piece shines with its own particular iridescence, and with its heady, joyous freedom and chamber music quality, the trio skirts the genre's chaotic pitfalls. From the catchy rhythmic/melodic riff and hard swing of Palar, to the haunting minimalism of Cert Van, on through the rapid-fire assault of Naimed, it's an alluring set! More Line-Up: Manfred Schoof (tp, flh), Peter Trunk (b), Cees See (dr) New Jazz Trio - Page Two //1972 With the addition of a string quintet, The New Jazz Trio's 'second page' expands on their first MPS album, Page One, by ingeniously melding the heady experimentation of the classical Avant-garde with the exuberant spontaneity of free jazz. For Schoof, the overall musical interaction rather than the individual solos had precedence. He specified that, "on every track all musicians played spontaneously." Yet soloistic passages weave in and out of a music that ranges from Ornette-like free jazz blanketed by the string section's "white noise" in Currents, the pointillist Feathered Friends, the frenetic…And Accents, the Mysterioso Sunmoonata, the frenzied Ludus Totalus, a deliriously jazzy Dolbi, the otherworldly Open Zoo, the receptive free-for-all of Portraits, the pulsating insistence of Hommage, on through to the intense drive of Absolute. This was a daring album for its time, one that has maintained its sense of urgent relevancy for nearly a half century. More Line-Up: Manfred Schoof (tp, flh), Peter Trunk (b), Cees See (dr), + Streichquintett MPS Records New Digital Releases Digital Mastered for iTunes Distribution: Edel:Kultur/ Kontor New Media MPS Records Homepage Release Date: May 19th, 2017 (2 months exclusively on iTunes. Subsequently available on all common download services.) Mastered for iTunes // 24-bit-Transfer from original master tapes // produced by Dirk Sommer write your comments about the article :: © 2017 Jazz News :: home page |