SEAN CONLY TRIO - The Buzz
577 Records- available as an LP, CD and digitally
Leo Genovese, piano; Sean Conly, electric/contrabass; Francisco Mela, drums
Recorded October 7, 2020 at Trading Eights Studio, Paramus, New Jersey, USA
I usually play an album from front to back at least once before writing anything, naturally, but as I had just finished a review of Genovese’s Ritmos de Agua, I chose to play this one from back to front and was astonished at the decorum of Stephen Sondheim’s Send in The Clowns, the final track on the album. I then realised that it acted as a bowing out from a performance that was all dignified and sedate. Much of that propriety is due not only to the piano/pianist, but also to the amalgamation of the three musicians’ individual inclinations in both classic and contemporary jazz styles.
Pianist Genovese is well recognised for his collaborations with many musicians of repute including, for example, Jack DeJohnette and the Wayne Shorter Group, as well as for his discography.
Bass player Sean Conly is a familiar spirit with much of the World’s music and this lends both contrivance and inventiveness to his performance. He is both player and composer and as he works with both, it is expected that he will, in both fields of endeavour, attempt to meld the old and the new approaches to song, sound, synchronisation and tempo into one, complete and inventive utterance.
Drummer Francisco Mela has been top choice for many of the leading musicians in jazz, among them Kenny Barron, Gary Bartz, Joe Lovano, John Scofield, McCoy Tyner and Bobby Watson. Studies at Berklee College of Music led to his teaching there, and developing his career on the Boston scene led to his working on putting together the traditional sounds he grew up with in Cuba with the newer sounds of modern jazz. Contact through Berklee brought him to Lovano and this was followed by McCoy Tyner’s hearing him play with Lovano and employing him from 2009.
Although all tunes really are compositions, they exhibit elements of a collective morphology, redolent of the languages which develop from free jazz improvisations. The sounds of these compositions are warm and sincere, echoing, I think, the ease that these musicians have in each other’s company. Another piano trio that’s not just another icon.
Reviewed by Ken Cheetham
577 Records- available as an LP, CD and digitally
Leo Genovese, piano; Sean Conly, electric/contrabass; Francisco Mela, drums
Recorded October 7, 2020 at Trading Eights Studio, Paramus, New Jersey, USA
I usually play an album from front to back at least once before writing anything, naturally, but as I had just finished a review of Genovese’s Ritmos de Agua, I chose to play this one from back to front and was astonished at the decorum of Stephen Sondheim’s Send in The Clowns, the final track on the album. I then realised that it acted as a bowing out from a performance that was all dignified and sedate. Much of that propriety is due not only to the piano/pianist, but also to the amalgamation of the three musicians’ individual inclinations in both classic and contemporary jazz styles.
Pianist Genovese is well recognised for his collaborations with many musicians of repute including, for example, Jack DeJohnette and the Wayne Shorter Group, as well as for his discography.
Bass player Sean Conly is a familiar spirit with much of the World’s music and this lends both contrivance and inventiveness to his performance. He is both player and composer and as he works with both, it is expected that he will, in both fields of endeavour, attempt to meld the old and the new approaches to song, sound, synchronisation and tempo into one, complete and inventive utterance.
Drummer Francisco Mela has been top choice for many of the leading musicians in jazz, among them Kenny Barron, Gary Bartz, Joe Lovano, John Scofield, McCoy Tyner and Bobby Watson. Studies at Berklee College of Music led to his teaching there, and developing his career on the Boston scene led to his working on putting together the traditional sounds he grew up with in Cuba with the newer sounds of modern jazz. Contact through Berklee brought him to Lovano and this was followed by McCoy Tyner’s hearing him play with Lovano and employing him from 2009.
Although all tunes really are compositions, they exhibit elements of a collective morphology, redolent of the languages which develop from free jazz improvisations. The sounds of these compositions are warm and sincere, echoing, I think, the ease that these musicians have in each other’s company. Another piano trio that’s not just another icon.
Reviewed by Ken Cheetham
