City of Broken Dreams

Giovanni Guidi Trio

CD18,90 out of print
EN / DE

Pianist Giovanni Guidi (born 1985), is one of the most outstanding musicians to have emerged from the ranks of Italian jazz in the last decade and has already made his presence felt on Enrico Rava’s “Tribe” and “On The Dancefloor” albums. Rava praises both Guidi’s “limitless curiosity” as an improviser and his “relentless refinement” of touch and musical taste, and the pianist continually proves that those qualities are not opposites. His first leader date for ECM is a glowing collection of self-penned tunes, simultaneously inner-directed and creatively daring, with many adroit exchanges between the musicians and plenty of space given also to bassist Thomas Morgan, whose role in the Guidi Trio is perhaps analogous to Scott LaFaro’s in the Evans Trio. Portuguese drummer João Lobo is another highly original musician, poetically shading the music with a delicate tracery of cymbals.

Der 1985 geborene Pianist Giovanni Guidi ist einer der außergewöhnlichsten Musiker, die der italienische Jazz im letzten Jahrzehnt hervorgebracht hat. Auf Enrico Ravas Alben „Tribe“ und „On The Dancefloor“ hat er bereits nachdrücklich auf sich aufmerksam gemacht. Rava rühmt sowohl Guidis „grenzenlose Neugier“ als auch die „unnachgiebige Raffinesse“, die sein Anschlag und sein musikalischer Geschmack offenbaren. Der Pianist beweist beständig, dass sich diese Qualitäten nicht widersprechen. Sein erstes Album als Leader für ECM ist eine glänzende Kollektion von Eigenkompositionen, gleichzeitig nach innen gewandt und voller kreativem Wagemut, mit vielen gewandten Dialogen zwischen den Musikern. Dabei bekommt Bassist Thomas Morgan, dessen Rolle im Guidi Trio vielleicht mit der von Scott LaFaro im Bill Evans Trio vergleichbar ist, reichlich Raum. Der portugiesische Schlagzeuger João Lobo, ebenfalls ein äußerst origineller Musiker, gibt der Musik mit filigranen Mustern auf den Becken poetische Schattierungen.

Featured Artists Recorded

December 2011, Auditorio RSI - Radio Svizzera, Lugano

Original Release Date

08.03.2013

  • 1City of Broken Dreams
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    07:17
  • 2Leonie
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    03:51
  • 3Just One More Time
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    04:13
  • 4The Forbidden Zone
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    03:39
  • 5No Other Possibility
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    06:25
  • 6The Way Some People Live
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    06:06
  • 7The Impossible Divorce
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    03:35
  • 8Late Blue
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    06:16
  • 9Ocean View
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    03:28
  • 10City of Broken Dreams, var.
    (Giovanni Guidi)
    07:11

“City of Broken Dreams” is the ECM leader debut of the prodigiously gifted Italian pianist Giovanni Guidi. Guidi has previously appeared on two discs for the label with Enrico Rava – “Tribe” with the Rava Quintet and the live “On The Dance Floor” with the Parco della Musica Jazz Lab band. Now he introduces his new international trio with US bassist Thomas Morgan and Portuguese drummer João Lobo, and a shimmering inner-directed music of striking originality. Lyrical free-floating ballads predominate, and the tunes seem optimally set up to showcase the strengths of his confrères. Bassist Thomas Morgan has as much room to move in this unit as Scott LaFaro had in the Bill Evans trios, or Gary Peacock in Paul Bley’s groups – invited in other words to interact in the foreground of the music. Guidi is generous with his space in these pieces, all from his pen, every one of them turning some unexpected corners.

In these haunting compositions, melodies can suddenly scuttle crabwise, and rhythms may be dislocated and stretched, sometimes setting up considerable tension, as on “No Other Possibility”. Sometimes, as on “The Way Some People Live”, Guidi casts down a carpet of gentle arpeggios for Morgan to glide across. João Lobo, an acute commentator, punctuates “The Impossible Divorce”, with disconsolate lunges at tom-toms and scrapes sticks agonizingly across cymbals at the climax of “Late Blue”. As the impressions accumulate, the “City of Broken Dreams” begins to seem like a short story collection, a series of vignettes from a lonesome place, to which the listener will feel drawn to return.