Voices, the first, at the end of the afternoon at the Municipal Theater of Nevers, on Saturday, November 9, opening day of the 38my edition of the D’Jazz Nevers Festival, scheduled until November 16, by pianist and singer Macha Gharibian. Sometimes alone in an Armenian song, most often blending with the vocal timbres of flautist Joce Mienniel and double bassist Arnault Cuisinier (Celebrate, M train).
And at night, in the large hall of La Maison, that of the double bassist Sélène Saint-Aimé, leading her quintet, then Himiko Paganotti, joining at the same time the wind section of the septet of double bassist Henri Texier, carrying to life in the reading/interpretation of the writings of Jacques Prévert or in the translation of a text by the leader of the Lakota Hunkpapas (Sioux), Sitting Bull (1831-1890).
Another link between these three concerts, musical trips. The one that partly traces the roots of Macha Gharibian, but also a form of folk-pop, classical music, American minimalism evoked in train m, whose inspiration comes from the composition Different trains (1988), by Steve Reich. With Sélène Saint-Aimé, it is the musical space of the Caribbean that is explored, through the rhythmic crossings between his Martinique roots and those of the Guadeloupean Sonny Troupé, drummer and ka drummer, with a possible trip, almost at the end of the Concert, towards Afro-Cuban jazz.
Mouth in or satisfaction
Finally, the stylistic forms of jazz, of the early days, of bop and its later, of free, that permeate the music of Henri Texier, come to nourish several compositions dedicated to Amerindians, at the heart of some of his albums, including the last one to date, The life of an Indian (October 2023, Label bleu/L’Autre Distribution) is widely reproduced.
We had some reservations during the concerts of Macha Gharibian, where the trio form sometimes seems destabilized by the too important place occupied by the flautist Joce Mienniel, and of Sélène Saint-Aimé, whose connivance and exchanges with Sonny Troupé are a strong point. , as happens with the trumpeter Hermon Mehari and the saxophonist Irving Acao, but where the pianist Xavier Bellin seems a little behind. The musician specifies, however, that this piano quintet was recent. It will be found later.
In Henri Texier’s concert everything is balanced between the performers, the ensemble parts, the solo parts, the shared attention, the improvisations of the appropriate duration and intensity. Texier’s radiant smile and O-shaped mouth of satisfaction listening to saxophonists and clarinetists Sylvain Rifflet and Sébastien Texier, trumpeter Carlo Nardozza, guitarist Manu Codjia, singer Himiko Paganotti and drummer Gautier Garrigue. With outbursts expressing anger at misdeeds committed against Native Americans (Black Indians, Dakota Mab, from the album sky dancers, in 2015…), tenderness whose theme, as a reminder, Steve and Carla, “little Parisian waltz”explains Texier, for Steve Swallow and Carla Bley, written and recorded before the American pianist and composer’s death on October 17, 2023.
You have 34.53% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
