Fred Nardin Trio: Look Ahead

With a master’s degree in music and a Django Reinhardt prize - musician of the year award from the Adamemie Du Jazz - already in his pocket, piano player Fred Nardin has little, if anything to prove. Already a man of many musical outlets, for Look Ahead he’s the head of a threesome, which is completed by double bass man Or Bareket and drummer Leon Parker. Sparse and yet full, the sound the trio make in many ways can be summed up by the song “Just Easy�, for while they don’t always make everything sound quite as laid back as that may suggest, the mood here is mellow and relaxed, even if the three-piece work decidedly hard to make it all sound so simple. The track in question also, in an understated fashion, finds room to allow Parker to astound with his keen snare work and for Bareket to dance from string to string as he works the frets and yet, as elsewhere on this disc, it really is almost always the sparkling piano from Nardin himself that truly sets the scene.

The piano man wrote all bar two of the eleven pieces played out, with Parker providing the brief skat and hand percussion of “New Direction�, a set-changing segue into the Herbie Hancock push and swirl of “One Finger Snap�, with the latter especially ramping up the urgency in a way that nothing else here wants to. That doesn’t hinder the clever pacing of this set though, the piano dance of “Memory Of T.� and gentle tumble of “In The Skies� being introduced by their own bespoke preludes, with both enigmatically illustrating the strength of their longer counterparts.

An album that drips with restraint but which can be playfully involving, Look Ahead thrives on the intricacies of its performances and also the breadth of its scope. Allowing the fragile air it conjures to be just as engaging as the confidence it so ably portrays.

Track Listing
1. COLOURS
2. JUST EASY
3. LOOK AHEAD
4. THREE FOR YOU
5. NEW DIRECTION
6. ONE FINGER SNAP
7. PRELUDE TO « MEMORY OF T. »
8. MEMORY OF T.
9. PRELUDE TO « IN THE SKIES »
10. IN THE SKIES
11. PRAYERS

Added: September 20th 2019
Reviewer: Steven Reid
Score:
Related Link: Fred Nardin online
Hits: 770
Language: english

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