released: 2007
Label: ECM
Catalogue no.: ECM 2078
About the album
Live recording of Arild Andersen’s exciting new trio, playing in Oslo’s Belleville club and at the Drammen Theatre, spurred on by an enthusiastic crowd. Apart from Duke Ellington’s “Prelude To A Kiss”, played with much feeling by Tommy Smith, the music is all written by Andersen, and it burns. “Live At Belleville” may be Arild’s most powerful trio recording since “Triptykon” with Garbarek and Vesala, back in 1972.
Reviews
CRITICS CHOICE
Arild Andersen creates a kaleidoscope of modern jazz composition. […]
Absolutely and unreservedly marvellous, and (being an ECM disc) sonically impeccable, too.
BBC Music Magazine
MY JAZZ album of the year. Norwegian bass maestro teams up with saxophonist Tommy Smith and Italian drummer Paolo Vinaccia in a trio that is brimming over with compelling ideas and creative invention.
The Scotsman
It’s all about masters at work: Andersen creating big, warm structures through real-time double tracking and his fingers scampering gleefully over the strings; Smith variously understated, magisterial and venomous; and Vinaccia a brilliantly responsive, subtly propulsive livewire whose dynamic range enhances quiet atmosphere and charging tempo alike.