En attendant - Marcin Wasilewski Trio
This magnificent piano trio graced the Polish Center of Wisconsin in November 2008, an event etched in my memory as the last concert I attended with my parents, before they died. “That was the best live jazz I’ve heard in years,” said my father, a lifelong jazz buff. For good reason, as the trio, with intact personnel for 26 years, demonstrates on En attendant. My father’s favorable impression also spoke to the threesome’s range of appeal.
They are a cutting-edge piano trio, as demonstrated by “In Motion,” a three-part piece scattered across the album. It seems largely free-improvised, while demonstrating organic cohesion – the effect of close and responsive listening to each other. Throughout the album, Wasilewski displays an exquisite pianistic touch at all dynamic levels, even amid awkwardly fingered chromatic chords. His harmonic and rhythmic sense suggest respectively, Bill Evans and Keith Jarrett influences.
Album spices include two surprising “covers”: Bach’s 25th “Goldberg” Variation unfurls with Evans-like grace and chording. On The Doors’ “Riders on the Storm,” they almost reinvent the song’s serpentine harmonic progression while maintaining that familiar form like jugglers with so many balls in the air, buoyed with an overtly swinging groove. The closing “Glimmer of Hope” radiates lyricism both asymmetric and gratifying.
