Ramona Horvath - Carmen's Karma (2023) Hi-Res

Ramona Horvath is a pianist who knows how to masterfully play the infinite nuances of this instrument with her ever-changing colors. This is the essence of this trio album, with Nicolas Rageau on double bass, who is also the conceptualizer, and Antoine Paganotti on drums, musical partners whose complicity is evident; in this record, each piece is inspired by a classical musical work while traversing both jazz and classical aesthetics, far from uniformity. We are decidedly on the jazz side here, but instead of Gershwin, Porter, Strayhorn, Mingus, or Monk, it is Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Enesco, Faure, or Ravel that provide the rich thematic and harmonic material. The musicians approach them naturally, without unnecessary deference, which sometimes hinders the exercise. The cocktail here is much more subtle than a simple "jazzification" of known pieces; they are considered more as sources of inspiration by our three musicians than taken literally, and this freedom makes it entertaining and always joyful.