Yonathan Avishai - The Parade (2016) [Hi-Res]

Fusing various inspirations going from Cuban music to New Orleans’ grooves, from African rhythms to the Harlem spirit of Duke Ellington, with the living tradition of jazz, and adding his own sensitive touch, French-Israeli pianist Yonathan Avishai presents the second volume of his ‘Modern Times’ project. Turning his trio into a quintet with clarinet/alto saxophone and percussions... here comes ‘The Parade’!

The Parade! Festive music, neighborhood parades and dancing in the streets... This is the title of the new album because Yonathan Avishai sees music as a vector for sharing and for collective pleasures, the way it is experienced throughout the Caribbean; in New Orleans, birthplace of jazz and where the tradition of Mardi Gras parades flourishes to this day; and in New York, where block parties and other impromptu picnics have transformed public spaces into meeting-places for over a century, from stride to boogaloo, to hip hop and electro.

Yonathan Avishai now presents the second chapter of his ‘Modern Times’ project, which he launched in 2015 with two of the most in-demand instrumentalists in France—the bassist Yoni Zelnik and the drummer Donald Kontomanou. The trio is now a quintet, also including the alto saxophonist and clarinetist César Poirier and the Cuban percussionist Inor Sotolongo, thus adding to the new repertoire touches of bolero, habanera and other Latin colors. Faithful to the principles of his esthetic and mining the vein of his previous album, Yonathan Avishai has written new compositions (as well as a highly singular arrangement of the John Lewis standard Django), each of which is like a painting or a story told with the sense of nuance and construction that has made his reputation.

As well as a meditation on cycles, silence also plays an important role in his compositions, striving to give each note the meaning and the resonance it deserves, in the subtle balance of a group that is capable of walking on eggshells or of engaging in percussive battles in an ‘orgy in rhythm’. As if returning to the source of the basic principles of jazz —the pulse of swing, the elegance of a simple melody, the expressive power of the blues, the obscure beauty of a chord—Yonathan Avishai is at the very heart of this musical genre he has made his own, developing a highly personal sound and a poetry of Chaplinesque grace, where humor and nostalgia also play a role.

César Poirier, clarinet, alto saxophone
Yonathan Avishai, piano, percussions
Yoni Zelnik, double bass
Donald Kontomanou, drums
Inor Sotolongo, percussions

Tracklist:
01. Yonathan Avishai - Le Nouveau Monde (1:59)
02. Yonathan Avishai - Poem For Ornette Coleman (1:40)
03. Yonathan Avishai - L’Arbre et l’Écureuil (4:01)
04. Yonathan Avishai - Once Upon a Time (4:49)
05. Yonathan Avishai - Zelda (7:37)
06. Yonathan Avishai - Que tal ? (1:10)
07. Yonathan Avishai - Simgik (5:55)
08. Yonathan Avishai - Django (5:00)
09. Yonathan Avishai - Death of a River (6:16)
10. Yonathan Avishai - Sandrine’s Garden (3:58)
11. Yonathan Avishai - Picnic (2:23)
12. Yonathan Avishai - The Battle (7:19)
13. Yonathan Avishai - Diminuendo (4:50)
14. Yonathan Avishai - The Parade (6:24)