Helge Sunde, Ensemble Denada - Finding Nymo (2009)
EAC | FLAC | Tracks (Cue&Log) ~ 290 Mb | Mp3 (CBR320) ~ 126 Mb | Scans included
Contemporary Jazz, Modern Big Band | Label: ACT | # 9492-2 | Time: 00:53:10
EAC | FLAC | Tracks (Cue&Log) ~ 290 Mb | Mp3 (CBR320) ~ 126 Mb | Scans included
Contemporary Jazz, Modern Big Band | Label: ACT | # 9492-2 | Time: 00:53:10
Helge Sunde is a 44-year-old Norwegian trombonist and composer who often works with jazz/classical composer Geir Lysne, sounds as if he checks out Hermeto Pascoal, Django Bates, Carla Bley, and British jazz and TV composer Colin Towns – and who has produced a cracker of a contemporary big-band album with this set. Sunde's Denada ensemble has produced powerful work before, but the balance of moods, melodic variety and arranging ingenuity on Finding Nymo (the sax-playing Nymo brothers Frode and Atle are star soloists) ought to raise his standing outside continental Europe. He throws listeners off the big-band scent with the eerie vocoder whispers at the start, but busy phrase-swapping between the horns, and arrhythmic ensemble riffs with solo-sax wails rising out of them introduce a Django Bates feel. When In Rome is a hooting, swaggering theme with revving engines and street noise, Valse Triste starts like a funeral lament and turns into a demonically waltzing dance, and the title track begins as tentative, sputtery improv, then coalesces into a melody. Guests Olka Konkova (piano) and Marilyn Mazur add flourishes to an already formidable set.