Joachim Kühn New Trio: Love & Peace

Pianist Joachim Kühn has been a recording artist since he first appeared on an album by trumpeter Werner Pfuller back in January 1963. That was before the Sixties period of Love & Peace, the title of the latest release by the Joachim Kühn New Trio. Bassist Chris Jennings and drummer Eric Schaefer are about 30 years younger, so that period of culture is before their time. In a sense, The Crystal Ship, a 1967 song by the Doors, is just as much a part of musical history as Mussogorsky’s 1884 suite Pictures At an Exhibition, from which Le Vieux Chateau is excerpted. For Kühn, this disc is about “strong melodies that you can give a shape to.” The contours that the trio sculpts are by and large on the relaxed side, like the gentle flow of the brief title track which opens the disc. I rather like the way that Kühn has altered the Doors tune to fit his purposes for this trio, finding hitherto unexplored emotional depths in the melody. The ravishing piano opening of Mustang leads us to a middle-tempo number with the bluesy flavor of a folk song. With a minimalist Jennings on bass and a basic beat from Schaefer, Kühn has plenty of room to strut his stuff. For Schaefer and Jennings, that sort of subordinate support is what they do best, at any tempo. But Strokes of Folk builds up quite a head of steam, and Casbah Radio, too, swings harder than most of the other tracks, with an unfettered Kühn delighting in the bluesy groove that composer Schaefer lays down. Ornette Coleman’s Night Plans was first heard on Colors, the saxophonist’s 1996 duet session with Kühn. Here the trio dissects it at a stately pace with the focus on the melody. Schaefer’s thumpy and repetitive drum part for Kühn’s own New Pharoah distracts mightily from the ceremonial sounding melody, making it the disc’s low point. The album concludes with another Kühn original, the smoking Phrasen whose melody has a distinctly Ornette Coleman flavor. After a spiky arco bass solo at the start, this six and a half minute romp features strong interplay and exciting solos all around. Except for that one lapse, Love & Peace is a pleasing set of piano jazz, with many exciting passages thanks to the fleet hands of Joachim Kühn.
ACT 9861; Joachim Kühn (p) Chris Jennings (b) Eric Schaefer (d); Pernes-les-Fontaines, France, May 15-16, 2017 ; Love and Peace/ Le Vieux Chateau/ The Crystal Ship/ Mustang/ Barcelona - Wien/ But Strokes of Folk/ Lied ohne Worte No. 2/ Casbah Radio/ Night Plans/ New Pharoah/ Phrasen; 46:38. www.actmusic.com