Short Kurts to a seriously happening Euro jazz scene this autumn in our latest snapshot

Autumn live gig overall jazz choices in the Euro clubs: Kurt Elling feat. Charlie Hunter who appear at the Blue Note in Milan on 4 and 5 November followed hard on the heels in the same spot by the Dave Holland supergroup - Aziza. Kurt Elling's …

Published: 23 Aug 2022. Updated: 20 months.

Autumn live gig overall jazz choices in the Euro clubs: Kurt Elling feat. Charlie Hunter who appear at the Blue Note in Milan on 4 and 5 November followed hard on the heels in the same spot by the Dave Holland supergroup - Aziza.

Kurt Elling's to-die-for version of the Doc Pomus classic 'Lonely Avenue' first recorded and released by Ray Charles in 1956 was the easy pick of the recent soaraway 5-track EP SuperBlue - The London Sessions from the great Chicagoan Elling. Backing vocals on this ''Live at the Pool'' set were by Vula Malinga and La Donna Young with Charlie Hunter taking a strutting but never over-the-top guitar solo that ambles along mightily and there's drummer Corey Fonville who provides a laidback groove as DJ Harrison divvies up an airplane-doing-the-taxiing like keyboards as the ensemble start to rev the mother up oh so effortlessly and roar to put their own stamp on this evergreen break-up beauty and run that particular voodoo of a heartbreak down.

ADDITIONAL CHOICES

  • A-Trane Berlin Julia Hülsmann Quartet 14 September

  • Blue Note, Milan Mike Stern Band 22 and 23 Sept, Jeremy Pelt Quintet 4 October, Yellowjackets 19 Oct, Kurt Elling 4 and 5 November, Aziza 11 Nov, Kenny Garrett 17 Nov, Richard Bona 25 November

And in another coup for Milan Aziza are to appear this autumn, that's the Dave Holland supergroup featuring bass legend Holland along with saxophonist Chris Potter, guitarist Lionel Loueke and drummer Eric Harland. Their 2016 self-titled album was - and remains - a sensation and classic of jazz made over the past 20 years. More on Dave - read an interview with the great in Leroy lives

  • Le duc des Lombards Paris Danny Grissett trio 14 September, Judith Owens and her New Orleans Gentlemen Callers 16 Sept, Camilla George 23 and 24 Sept, Billy Hart quartet feat Ethan Iverson 27 and 28 Sept

  • Moods Zurich Rymden 3 October, Shai Maestro Quartet 15 Oct, Mark Guiliana 18 Oct, Eivind Aarset Quartet 25 Oct, Ashley Henry 31 Oct, The Bad Plus 7 Nov, Makaya McCraven 12 Nov, Linda May Han Oh Quartet 15 Nov

  • Sunset Sunside Paris Aruán Ortiz trio 14 Sept, Tord Gustavsen trio 30 Sept and 1 Oct, Dan Tepfer 4 and 5 Oct, Peter Bernstein Quartet feat Sullivan Fortner 19 Oct, Tim Hagans Quartet 29 Oct, Aaron Parks Little Big 2 Nov, Ariel Bart 22 Nov, Steve Kuhn trio 25 and 26 Nov,

  • Unterfahrt Munich Julia Hülsmann Quartet 29 Sept Bob Reynolds Group 8 Oct

  • Victoria Nasjonal Jazzscene Oslo Nils Petter Molvær 9 Sept, Hakon Kornstad trio 1 Oct, Helen Sung trio 8 Oct, Gretchen Parlato trio 14 Oct, James Brandon Lewis trio 20 Oct, Julian Lage, 21 Oct, Trygve Seim 27 Oct, John McLaughlin 23 and 24 Nov, Jacob Young Trio 10 December.

Kurt Elling, top

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John Escreet, Equipoise, Whirlwind ****

State of the art piano trio. If anything way ahead of the curve. Track of the day and new in the 1 Luv slot it's the formidable English expat Stateside based avant pianist John Escreet here with Branford Marsalis quartet and Tarbaby bassist Eric …

Published: 22 Aug 2022. Updated: 20 months.

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State of the art piano trio. If anything way ahead of the curve.

Track of the day and new in the 1 Luv slot it's the formidable English expat Stateside based avant pianist John Escreet here with Branford Marsalis quartet and Tarbaby bassist Eric Revis and the Glasperian drummer Damion Reid.

Escreet is impossible to categorise. Last time we heard him live was with Logan Richardson but it's very different here because he switches to interject oblique vamps against a roiling open beat and avant drum groove that eventually delivers up a spiky concise statement in the break-out from the theme that not only shows his immense command of the piano well away from say the Kansas City sound that Richardson sometimes draws on by veering more towards the European avant garde, a space that say Bruno Heinen is just as comfortable with when Heinen opts to conjure Stockhausen. But Escreet's original approach to the discipline of improvisation by leveraging tightly disciplined construction in the composition still retains an unerring ability to uncoil from its exacting rigour to land in a seemingly spontaneous direction that you can't expect. Based on what we glean from these tantalising minutes of power and passion at ease both in the sprint and laying back to a very fast jog in the assorted tempi it's more than the sum of the three parts we are certainly looking forward to hearing Seismic Shift from which the track is drawn in its entirety on release in October.

Eric Revis, top left, John Escreet, Damion Reid. Photo: artist's Twitter page