Ralph Towner & Paolo Fresu - Chiaroscuro

I (we) had 48 hours of almost non-stop engagements: 4 appointments on Friday, then friends based in Jerusalem visiting us on Friday evening and Saturday, other friends on Saturday evening. This morning I started with a sloshy run through the forest (met two deer!), then breakfast, doing the dishes and then I settled down for a while with a wary eye on the melting snow that fell from an ash-grey sky. Time to gather around a musical fireplace - listening couch snugly lined up in an equilateral triangle with the speakers - with a marvelously intimate and moody ECM disc.  

Chiaroscuro features Ralph Towner on guitars (classic, 12 string and baritone) and Paolo Fresu on trumpet and fluegelhorn in a series of mostly Towner's compositions. Fresu caught my ear several years ago on Ornella Vanoni's Sheherazade with his sensational, super-cultivated solos. Since I have collected several of his Blue Note recordings with his own quintet. It's great to see him join the ECM roster. Together with Enrico Rava and Tomasz Stanko they now have a superb lineup of brass players. It was Kris Duerinckx who introduced me to Ralph Towner via his 1978 album Batik (he wanted to draw my attention to JackDeJohnette's remarkable contribution to it). Since I added his Anthem to my collection but there is a whole series of ECM discs I have yet to discover.

Already the cover of this CD transports me back to that morning roughly 20 years ago when we were making our way to the Geisspfadpass on the Swiss-Italian border. We set off from Alpe Devero and headed to the northeast hitting the shores of the Lago di Devero by mid-morning. The sun reflected in dramatic chiaroscuro on the lake's surface. A timeless spectacle. It must have been a moment close to perfection as I can recall it so very vividly.

The music on this recording is wonderfully euphonious. Only a hint of improvisation. A tastefully placed dissonant here and there. But otherwise it's just an opportunity to indulge in a series of richly harmonised, almost romantic vignettes. The atmosphere is wistful and mysterious, darkly shaded by the lush timbre of the bariton guitar and the mellow fluegelhorn. Despite the music's accessibility, there is nothing 'easy' or new agey about it. This is superbly tasteful musicianship displayed in an unlikely but remarkable symbiosis of two very different voices. On the B&W 804s it just sounds gorgeous. You can hear the music between the notes. The disc's centerpiece is a track called 'Sacred Place'. The deep sensitivity and reverence that speaks from the music belies the rather grandiose kitschiness of the title. The chokingly beautiful theme is first elaborated by Towner solo in a very classic, restrained way. But every notes plumbs great melancholy depths. Later on there is shorter reprise in which the guitar is joined by Fresu's supremely polished and reflective fluegelhorn. It's just the kind of thing I needed today with that melting snow falling out of an ash-grey sky.