Joe Lovano: Trio Tapestry
(Wigmore Hall, 12 April 2024, review by Jon Turney)

Joe Lovano’s work with Marilyn Crispell and Carmen Castaldi has been one of his main creative outlets now since 2018, with a trio of lauded albums on ECM showing three masters deepening their interaction. While Crispell brings capacious piano technique and contemporary classical tones in place of Bill Frisell’s Americana-infused guitar, it’s the group closest in spirit to the fabled trio with Lovano, Frisell and the late Paul Motian, with Castaldi fitting comfortably into Motian’s freewheeling role on the drums.

The adjective that crops up regularly in reviews of the trio’s recordings is “ethereal”, but there was little of that at this eagerly awaited London show on their current European tour. As well as pretty full on playing from all present, there was a regrettably high level of amplification. Regrettable as this is music with few hand holds for the uninitiated that benefits from the crystalline clarity of every note on an ECM recording. A concert Steinway rarely benefits from a signal boost, and the piano tones, in particularly were a little muddy in the body of the hall.

The prevailing high volume also seemed to flatten out the dynamic, with much of the trio’s single 90-minute set offering little variation in sound. Lovano’s occasional brief announcements indicate that he regards the many compositions he has now made for this group rather as a single body of work. And so they sounded as they drew freely on pieces from all three recordings. That may not work entirely to their advantage. If the trio has a governing principle, it is spelt rubato – counting in is definitely not the order of the day. They largely eschew common jazz vocabulary, and the themes tend to sound like freely improvised lines committed to paper. At some early moments, as one faintly dolorous, mid-tempo piece succeeded another, it was not obvious where one ended and the next began.

The effect was a demand for fierce concentration from the listener to match that being applied on stage. That indeed brought its rewards, with astonishing playing from all three. Crispell’s piano flights were frequently transfixing. Lovano, resplendent in red shirt, white beret, and shades, listened to her solo excursions on one side with the expression of a man savouring a very good wine. The nominal leader and main composer stuck to tenor saxophone apart from a little light gong work, and one splendid spell on the clarinet-like tárogató which produced an arresting duo with Castaldi.

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After that piercing highlight, the closing selections seemed to acquire a little more breathing space. The Coltraneisms of the newest recording’s title piece, Our Daily Bread, became a rousing call to celebration from Lovano’s tenor, Wayne Shorter’s Lady Day offered a brief glimpse of how the trio responded to someone else’s writing, and Seeds of Change, which I think Lovano indicated was the first piece he wrote for the trio, brought them back at the end to their beginning. Trio Tapestry play with an imposing confidence in their style, and in each other, producing music that the recordings confirm benefits from repeat listening to reveal all its virtues – a live album now would be a great addition to their discography.

Jon Turney writes about jazz, and other things, from Bristol.jonturney.wordpress.com / https://bsky.app/profile/jonturney.bsky.social

LINK: LJN coverage of Joe Lovano