Ridiculously prolific Norwegian pianist and composer Espen Berg has already made his mark this year with a series of intense solo piano recordings. But the chamber music of Water Fabric is even more distinctive with its genre exploding character and voracious appetite for mixing and matching genre whether firmly rooted in jazz or voyaging far beyond. A sextet album with a strong rhythmical character to its lead lines from trumpeter Hayden Powell on 'Circumzenithal' for instance that provide lots of character and is at its strongest in terms of jazz flavour on 'Triple Point Suite'. Drummer Per Oddvar Johansen, (no stranger to fans of that other fine Norwegian pianist Helge Lien) violinist Harpreet Bansal, violist Ellie Mäkelä and cellist Joakim Munkner complete the line-up and the writing for strings is neatly interwoven into the more expansive passages, lilting so engagingly especially on 'Triple Point Suite' where folk influences also find plenty of space to freely roam.
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