JAZZ
BY ANDY COWAN
Sam Gendel, Benny Bock, Hans Kjorstad
★★★★
Dream Trio
LEAVING. CD/DL/LP
Three avant-jazz improvisors push the boundaries on intimate set recorded in Japan.
Having reworked Joni Mitchell and Judee Sill on The Doober (with bassist Sam Wilkes) and explored bossa nova on The Room (with guitarist Fabiano do Nascimento), Sam Gendel’s third collaborative album of 2024 is his most unorthodox yet.
Alternating between wind controller and soprano sax, his dexterous cascades of notes are punctuated by unexpected flashes of skronk as he weaves between Bock’s udo synth and Kjorstad’s subtle violin. While a cheerful sense of abandon runs through the liquid phraseology of India and glitchy, microtonal Charango, it’s often hard to determine where one player ends and the other begins – particularly amid the Sakamoto-like drift of FallsLake. Elsewhere, the unlikely mutations of Ten Dreams reveal something more impressionistic, performed with grace and restraint.