Description

Ten years together – already an impressive feat for any relationship in this day and age; for a jazz group, virtually unheard of. Yet the Pablo Held Trio has survived and flourished: in January pianist/composer Held, bassist Robert Landfermann and drummer Jonas Burgwinkel completed Lineage, their eighth PIROUET album together, and are now in the midst of a year-long tour spanning three continents. At the age of 29 Held has a decade of astounding music behind him. It has won him International praise as one of the most innovative pianists in jazz, and his trio is at the creative center. Downbeat points out that, “… no matter how distinctive the frame, the trio is the picture, always sounding like its ruminative, glowing self.” As for Lineage, Held says that, “it has always been important to me where we come from – what influences us – My music is as much influenced by Monk as it is by Debussy or Bach. Everything that influences me is part of that lineage.” The pieces are mostly played as written, and yet there is such a feeling of integrated freedom that it is often difficult to know where the writing ends and the improvisation begins. For all its complexity, the music has an innate naturalness, brilliantly balanced between the known and the unknown; it makes you think and feel the exuberance of discovering something new, something you’ve never heard played quite that way before. As Pablo Held says, “We’ve been together for ten years now but it doesn’t feel like it. It still feels fresh when we play together, it still has that enthusiasm and energy, and I don’t think we are anywhere near done.”