Like other Maalouf albums, at least those I've heard since first encountering this 2012 release, this hangs together as a whole piece, as if written around a central theme. I wonder if his classical training is responsible for that.
He composed this particular release on commission as the score for a 1927 silent film, La Proie du Vent (The Prey of the Wind). I haven't had the pleasure, but it's not a big leap of association to imagine this as a soundtrack.
Normally, the strapline Original Soundtrack to the Motion Picture wouldn't inspire my ears to prick up. Fortunately, this doesn't carry that billing, but even if it did, this is one of those instances when my irrational prejudices get a well deserved kick in the teeth.
In July 2013, Jazzy G, a couple of other friends and I were heading for our second consecutive visit to the brilliant North Sea Jazz festival. Unlike the previous year, when work had meant I'd missed the Friday and had to catch up with the guys in Rotterdam on Saturday morning, I'd got my shit together and cleared my diary well in advance. This time, I stayed at Jazzy G's place on the Thursday night and we were all booked on the same flight Friday morning.
We had a few drinks in town before heading back to Jazzy G's, where he put this album on the turntable. My first thought was:
Miles? Er... no. That Miles-esque, under-stated approach to melody, timing and space, but... who is this?
It's blue, for sure - this oozes melancholy in places, but those different, eastern-sounding notes... another kind of blue altogether, the like of which I'd never heard before.
In classic Jazzy G fashion, he'd shelled out on the latest release by an artist we were about to see live. He brought the CD along, and it became a frequent spinner aboard the old barge we'd hired for accommodation. So I was well and truly hooked by the Saturday evening, when the band played most of the album and a few earlier tunes. The giant video projection revealed the secret to that amazing sound - the microtonal or four-valve trumpet invented by his father, classical trumpeter Nassim Maalouf, which makes it possible to play Arabic maqams on the trumpet.
And damn, can he play it! The guy has technique in spades. And you're unlikely ever to hear more gorgeously expressive, beautifully restrained trumpet playing than on tunes like Waiting and Surprises. There's even one tune, Excitement, that (to me at least) evokes drunken staggers through urban landscapes - quite appropriate for the festival, as it turned out.
And that association with Coltrane's Sound? Simply that Mark Turner's tenor reminds me so much of JC on Kind of Blue. Yes, I realise that's tenuous to say the least, but give this a listen and you'll see what I mean.
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