The Blue Land

Matthieu Bordenave

Released on 26/01/2024 by ECM Records
Main artists: Matthieu Bordenave
Genre: Jazz

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Matthieu Bordenave, a French saxophonist settled in Germany for several years now, became known to an international audience in 2020 with the release of La Traversée, his first record for the prestigious label ECM, recorded as a trio with Swiss bassist Patrice Moret and German pianist Florian Weber. Although his music at the time mainly relied on its orchestration and on the free, chamber jazz tonalities invented in the early 60s by Jimmy Giuffre, Paul Bley et Steve Swallow, Bordenave made music rife with treasured harmonies borrowed from great French composers Henri Dutilleux and Olivier Messiaen. At the same time, he allowed himself to make unmistakable references to jazz in his saxophone playing, summoning an entire imaginary inherited from the West Coast (Stan Getz), the Lennie Tristano school (Warne Marsh), and even a certain post-Coltrane school (Joe Lovano of the Paul Motian trio).

He returns with The Blue Land, joined by the same accomplices, although propelled this time around by the precise drumming of London-based James Maddren. In this quartet configuration, which modifies the music’s dynamics and colours while still maintaining its general aesthetic, Bordenave, across a series of original pieces that emphasise his talents as a composer, displays with each his simultaneously meandering and angular phrasing and all of the subtlety and refinement of music that’s decidedly open, cerebral and sensual at once. Confirmation that Bordenave’s is a new voice to attentively follow in the years to come. © Stéphane Ollivier/Qobuz

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The Blue Land

Matthieu Bordenave

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