Europe Jazz Media Chart - November 2019

Koma Sax, a new quintet instigated and led by bass beast Petter Eldh gathering the sweeping horns of  Finnish and Swedish forces Mikko Innanen, Jonas Kullhammar and Otis Sandsjö plus the driven and and driving inner chiseling of impetuous power-drummer Christian Lillinger - actually heavy action on the Berlin - Helsinki axis. It is music in the neck and breath of present time, a compact, highly densified, mighty new form of outright core jazz of its own, resting on strong and valid self-reliance. This music has a double expressive impact. It gives a clear and urgent feeling of facing straight to the time, to the realities we are living in. Also, it bundles up a decided, feathered, infectious counter force. It is musically deep core jazz of the best and radical new cut.

What would Django Reinhardt play if he were still alive? You have the answer, with many sparkling bubbles. The trio has matured, they are less in a hurry and they are lingering to do it right. French jazz is still as powerful as ever.

Following the highly acclaimed “Unloved” of two years ago, “Three Crowns” is the second album recorded for ECM by Maciej Obara’s Polish-Norewgian Quartet, whom John Fordham praised in “The Guardian” as „improvisers of cosmic energy”. This newest material includes the leader’s six new pieces as well as jazz interepretations of two works by the great late Polish classical composer Henryk Mikołaj Górecki. Obara’s closing ballad “Mr. S” is a tribute to Tomasz Stańko. The Maciej Obara Quartet are: Obara - as, Dominik Wania - p, Ole Morten Vagan - b, Gard Nilssen - dr.

Singer Olga Sinyaeva emerged as a performer of jazz standards, but is was her work with Anton Chekurov Sextet which marked her switch to original repertoire: loud, electric, assertive, and pierced by virtuosic dashing instrumental solos, all in all exactly what the young urban audience preferred. Be sure they are virtuosic, as the sextet leader's other job is the 1st alto sax chair in Igor Butman's Moscow Jazz Orchestra where instrumentalists' excellence is required, and the guitar player, Evgeny Pobozhiy, also works in the same big band.