MANU KATCHÉ (FRA, ITA, GBR)
Luca Aquino (trumpet), Tore Brunborg (tenor and soprano saxophones), Jim Watson (Hammond B3 organ, piano), Manu Katché (drums)
For his fourth ECM album, titled just Manu Katché, the great French-Ivorian drummer reshuffles the line-up of his band once more, and presents a new program of compact, self-penned tunes. The revolving door policy is part of Katché’s song writing concept: “If you write all your own music, you’re aware of your limitations. It helps to have a changing cast of musicians, because they naturally bring in things you wouldn’t have expected. It’s really been the idea since the first album in 2004 keep on changing the band.” Choices of musicians have usually been inspired by meetings and encounters. “I’ll get to play with someone and then try to have his style, or at least the essence of his style, in mind when I write the music at the piano.”
Only Norwegian saxophonist Tore Brunborg remains from the group heard on Third Round. “In the band sound, Tore is a ‘leader’, sonically,” Manu explains. “Even if I play melodically on my instrument, as a drummer I have other responsibilities in the ensemble. I can’t always be the leading voice. Tore’s approach to the melodies and the themes, in the studio and also live, is just right, and his sound has become the sound that I hear in my imagination when I write new music. He’s my main man.”
At the core of the new pieces, however, is Manu’s unmistakable drum sound, and the album opens with the sound of him alone on “Running After Years”. He speaks of the feeling of freedom he finds in working with London-based keyboardist Jim Watson, who on several tracks covers also some of the role of bass with the pedals of his Hammond B3. “This is the first of my own albums where I’ve worked without a bass player. Usually I’m working very closely with a bassist. But I wanted to make some quite radical changes in the band, and the sound of the Hammond is something I’ve always loved.”
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