Expressive between classical music and jazz
Five on Fire have long since moved on from the easily digestible jazz of the past. The formation around Daniel Gubelmann now has higher aspirations - and is now making common cause with classical music.
On her debut Struggle or play (2007), Five on Fire focused on easily digestible jazz with funk interjections. Six years later, however, the formation around Daniel Gubelmann reinvented itself and began collaborating with a string quartet. For the latest album Eternal movement this approach was developed further and a large string ensemble from the Musikkollegium Winterthur was used.
Gubelmann's aim was to combine jazz with classical music and improvisation, searching for powerful melodies and the greatest possible expressiveness. The musician and composer, who trained in Bern, Zurich and Buenos Aires and is known in particular for his lyrical saxophone playing, allows his jazz quartet to play on an equal footing with the string orchestra. The result is an almost symbiotic sound that ignores genre boundaries.
The title of the record, "Ewigkeit der Bewegung" (Eternity of Movement), suggests that the project does not stand for understatement, on the contrary. Accordingly, what is on offer is impressive and full of drama. Whereby the prelude, the delicate Preludio de Buenos Aireswhich is entirely the responsibility of the string orchestra, is surprisingly restrained at first. This is followed by El rio de las estrellaswhich is characterized by a sublime conversation between saxophone and piano and features melancholy timbres. With La flor del amor Gubelmann's flair for the tango finally makes itself felt - with great passion and sometimes furious rhythms.
According to Gubelmann, his eight compositions claim to be able to manage without pictures. Nevertheless Eternal movement a cinematic suite that references Astor Piazzolla, Stan Getz and John Coltrane, among others. The result is an album that is as daring as it is eloquent, that goes its own way and knows how to impress.
Five on Fire feat. Musikkollegium Winterthur: Eternal movement. Solo Musica SM407
