ノルウェー発、ポップス/ロック/エレクトロニカなど様々な音楽の感性を内包し、ジャズを新たな次元に高めるノルウェーのトランペッター、マティアス・アイクの昨年リリースのECM5作目が180g重量盤Pでも登場。

発売・販売元 提供資料 （2022/04/12）

When We Leave is trumpeter/composer Mathias Eicks fifth leader outing for ECM and his first since 2018s acclaimed Ravensburg. Recorded over two days in November 2020, his sidemen include violinist Hakon Aase, pianist Andreas Ulvo, bassist Auden Erlien, drummers Thorstein Lofthus and Helge Norbakken, and pedal steel guitarist Stian Carstensen. All but the steel player -- who has also worked with Eick before -- appeared on Ravensburg. The trumpeter composed all seven pieces here; they are each identified by a single-word title. Fans of Jaga Jazzist, Eicks other band, will need to adjust their expectations. These compositions reflect the trumpeters long-held preoccupation with the murky spaces between folk music and modern European jazz. Opener Loving offers a drifting, moody piano playing elegiac chords that introduce a lithe lyric line played by trumpet and violin. The two lead instruments circle one another and gradually, as the drummers begin to exchange phrases and time signatures as accents for the frontline players, engage major and minor modes before Aase delivers a sumptuous solo complemented by fills from Ulvo. Turning is introduced by plucked violin and bass before piano, violin, and trumpet cascade in a languid, vamp-like melody. Eicks lyricism offers staggered cadences for doubled brass and string harmonies. They add levels of depth and dimension that resist easy classification. The trumpeters solo, while brief, elevates the tunes entire dramatic premise. While Flying appears improvised initially, it opens to express a sparse, even skeletal piano melody that Carstensen and Eick hover over and dole out in single lines for the other players to improvise on. Arvo, obviously inspired by Estonian composer Arvo Part, commences with a wispy Gregorian chant feel as Eicks trumpet, wordless vocals, and Aases spectral violin exchange phrases, lines, and a mode. The drummers then enter one at a time, followed by Erlien and finally Carstensen, who adds sweeping chord voicings and canny pedal work to elevate the entire proceeding texturally and dynamically. It actually approaches the orchestral until the drummers snares engage in staggered, nearly martial breakbeat rhythms. Playing follows logically. Carstensen controls the tunes body as the two drummers speak in a somewhat urgent processional language. Eick and Aase converse along the economically notated lyric line. Closer Begging sounds like a benediction or an exit hymn. Its slow, atmospheric, and at once pastoral and regal. The delicacy in Eicks aching melody expressionistically weds the sacred and the natural worlds while the pianist walks out the changes as an affirmation, and both drummers employ brushes in painting the backdrop with whispering cymbals and snares. Carstensen and Aase speak directly to Eicks lyric solo, embellishing it with textured phrases and elongated octave notes. Eicks composing on When We Leave is muted yet rich, lovely, and sophisticated. He understands exactly how to write to this particular ensembles strengths, and draws them out individually to express, along with him, longing and vulnerability. ~ Thom Jurek

Rovi