Shai Maestro Trio - Shai Maestro Trio (2012)

Israeli-born pianist Shai Maestro is familiar to UK audiences through his often-thrilling work with bassist/composer Avishai Cohen. He's now confirming that promise in his own group, with sometime Lee Konitz drummer Ziv Ravitz and Peruvian bassist Jorge Roeder, on an all-original repertoire except for the wistfully dignified traditional song Kalimankou Denkou. Cohen's swaying, romantically intense and cinematic music is immediately evoked in the alternately rippling and thunderous ‘Confession’, while the jaunty ‘Brave Ones’ sounds like a country-rock ballad (but develops with a catchily EST-like balance of freedom and certainty), and the meditative ‘Painting’ is a reverie under which arco bass murmurs and intensifying cymbal splashes steadily swell. Maestro's classical touch retains an expressive delicacy whatever the mood. Occasionally he restricts himself to fragmentary phrases inserted into remorseless drum-hooks and Roeder's luxurious basslines, and ‘The Flying Shepherd’ is a childlike dance that develops as a rhythm-stretching game. The Avishai Cohen dedication ‘One for AC’ could have come straight out of the repertoire of this gifted young pianist's famous mentor. Maestro's solo career is going to be one to watch. ~ John Fordham, TheGuardian.com. 

Laborie Records, LJ18, 2012
Recorded 2012 at Studio Laborie, Limoges, France 

Musicians:
Shai Maestro - Piano, Arranger
Jorge Roeder - Bass
Ziv Ravitz - Drums 

Tracks:
01. Confession {Shai Maestro} (0:31)
02. Sleeping Giant {Shai Maestro} (7:02)
03. Brave Ones {Shai Maestro} (9:57)
04. Painting {Shai Maestro} (5:02)
05. Silent Voice {Shai Maestro} (5:20)
06. Angelo {Shai Maestro} (4:27)
07. Lethal Athlete {Shai Maestro} (2:53)
08. The Flying Shepherd {Shai Maestro} (4:59)
09. Kalimankou Denkou {Traditional} (4:56)
10. One For AC {Shai Maestro} (4:35)
11. Tack On {Shai Maestro} (2:58) 

Total Time: 52:48 

Credits:
Producer - Laborie Records
Executive Producer - Jean-Michel Leygonie, Boris Jourdain
Recording & Mixing Engineer - Philippe Abadie
Assistant Engineer - Nicolas Denis
Mastering Engineer - Nate Wood
Photography - Jean-Baptiste
Photography [Pages 2&7] - Malene Marquez
Painting - Vilislava Boyadjieva
Design - Jean-Louis Duralek 

Note:
Original #10 (11:33) finished around 4:35 as indicated in booklet then starts again at 8:35
I have separated both adding #11 as "Tack On"