“December Avenue” by Tomasz Stanko

Tomasz Stanko has something that Miles Davis also had: an absolutely unmistakable trumpet sound. When you first hear him, it seems merely rough. But then that unique fragility immediately becomes audible too. It is as if self-assurance and shyness formed an entirely natural symbiotic pair.

Since 2013 and the album “Wislawa”, the Pole has been making music with young musicians, all of whom he met in New York. “December Avenue”, the current record by the Tomasz Stanko New York Quartet, brings together under the 75-year-old’s leadership the Cuban David Virelles on piano, bassist Reuben Rogers from the Virgin Islands and the American Gerald Cleaver on drums. All of them have successful careers of their own, but the chance to work with the master of dark melody is, needless to say, irresistible.

The quartet’s name says it all: the melting pot as adopted home is meant to be audible. Here Europe and the Caribbean meet at the heart of jazz. The result is not bright, shimmering colours, but fine-grained soundscapes steeped in sepia.