Swinging big bands have a scarcity value and luxury complexion these days maybe more than ever. That makes this sighting by Italian master pianist Enrico Pieranunzi with internationally renowned Belgian trumpeter Bert Joris and the Frankfurt Radio Big Band from Germany something of a multi-nation beacon of light and object of fascination given our tastes and stylistic predilections today.
Pieranunzi first met the charismatic Chet Baker in the late-1970s and compositions here he ''composed expressly for Chet'' are on this likeable album that encourages a trip down memory lane but isn't so stuck in the past as that rummaging into jazz history might indicate. Pieranunzi notes that in Joris' playing ''there are clear traces of Chet’s style, reworked in a very personal way''. And fittingly you don't get the feeling at all that Joris is playing a pastiche of Baker - quite the contrary he is instead being completely appropriate to the style and flavour in his role and touch.
The Frankfurt Big Band bearing in mind its firepower knows how to be nimble. And intimacy is not neglected, so for example on third track 'Chet' with Hans Glawischnig's bass line responding to syncopated prodding from Pieranunzi you get a sense of delicacy on the record that is the flip side to say the rip roaring exuberance exhibited on 'Brown Cat Dance.'
Joris and Pieranunzi have collaborated before on 2021's intimate duo album Afterglow also issued by Challenge
With all the Chet Remembered compositions by Pieranunzi and these arranged by Joris the trumpeter's soloing on 'Soft Journey' is the best place to find some of his most involving work. 'Night Bird' later manages to tame the coltish horns and the relatively brash opening tutti in the deft navigation the melody line negotiates leading eventually to superb alto saxophone work from Heinz-Dieter Sauerborn.
Compositions from 1980 release Soft Journey that Pieranunzi recorded in Rome with Chet are included on Chet Remembered and include 'Soft Journey,' 'Brown Cat Dance,' 'Night Bird' and 'Fairy Flowers'
Given the inclusion of tracks such as 'Soft Journey' it is practically obligatory to step back in time and listen to Baker and Pieranunzi together. Overall 'The Real You' is so appealing, probably most beautiful and certainly the sentimental choice the treatment containing all sorts of elements including an unabashed brassiness and a love of melody that is channelled and decanted so carefully. UK CD release is this coming Friday.
Bert Joris and Enrico Pieranunzi, photo: via Proper for Challenge
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