Julian Lage, View with a Room, Blue Note ****

The second high profile jazz album to appear this year sharing almost but not quite the same title because View with a Room is handily shorn of the indefinite article the first being Trish Clowes' release on Greenleaf. This latest couldn't be more …

Published: 7 Sep 2022. Updated: 19 months.

The second high profile jazz album to appear this year sharing almost but not quite the same title because View with a Room is handily shorn of the indefinite article the first being Trish Clowes' release on Greenleaf. This latest couldn't be more different to saxist Clowes' dreamily oblique vision, Julian Lage preferring instead a rustic Americana and driving rootsy approach once again. Already approaching icon status he has been part of the jazz furniture for years and with a technique and crucially playful flair that make him stand out from the crowd here he is with Squint bassist Jorge Roeder, again that connection The Bad Plus drummer Dave King and the great Bill Frisell playing originals that are both spirited and cerebral. Beyond grammar an indefinite sense not at all Lage is increasingly the definitive article in terms of jazz guitar syntactically and semantically rich in structure and meaning with bluesiness never more than a step or two away.

Out on 16 September. Four tracks are streaming ahead of full release

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Eliane Elias, 'Só Tinha Que Ser Com Você' ('This Love That I’ve Found'), Candid ***

A year on from the release of the fabulous Mirror Mirror new and drawn from Quietude (Candid, 14 October) easy listening bossa nova once again from the great Brazilian singer-pianist on a cover of Jobim and Aloísio de Oliveira's 'Só Tinha Que Ser …

Published: 7 Sep 2022. Updated: 19 months.

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A year on from the release of the fabulous Mirror Mirror new and drawn from Quietude (Candid, 14 October) easy listening bossa nova once again from the great Brazilian singer-pianist on a cover of Jobim and Aloísio de Oliveira's 'Só Tinha Que Ser Com Você' ('This Love That I’ve Found') which following a year on after Jobim's own version sung by Astrud Gilberto on The Astrud Gilberto Album released in 1965 the same year a version Jobim made with an orchestra conducted by Nelson Riddle appeared. The Elias track ain't gonna change the planet. But it's perfectly pleasant. And that peerless pianistic touch of Elias' while very contained in this song is always highly listenable to as is her very soft voice which is less fragile than Gilberto's by a long way. Quietude personnel include guitarists Marcus Teixeira, Lula Galvão and Oscar Castro-Neves (1940-2013), the drummer Celso de Almeida and bassist/co-producer Elias' husband, the great Marc Johnson. Wine bars will be ordering copies of Quietude in bulk and it's still five months to Valentine's. The mood on this track alone is certainly very date night friendly. But if you're not all loved up the track's purring predictability might make you want to walk on by. SG. Eliane Elias, photo: press