Product Description

No Description Available
No Track Information Available
Media Type: CD
Artist: GUSTAVSEN,TORD TRIO
Title: GROUND
Street Release Date: 04/05/2005
Domestic
Genre: JAZZ

Track Listing

1. Tears Transforming
2. Being There
3. Twins
4. Curtains Aside
5. Colours of Mercy
6. Sentiment
7. Kneeling Down
8. Reach Out and Touch It
9. Edges of Happiness
10. Interlude
11. Token of Tango
12. The Ground

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18104 in Music
• Brand: GUSTAVSEN,TORD TRIO
• Released on: 2005-04-05
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .24 pounds

Amazon.com
The second album by Norwegian pianist and composer Tord Gustavsen is another set of crystalline beauty. Lyrical in both his writing and playing, the music is informed by his Scandinavian homeland's austere landscapes, as well as a wide swath of jazz traditions and gospel influences from his youth (as a teenager Gustavsen was a church organist). The trio's interplay is supple and subtle to the point of the rhythm section sounding like they're actually a part of the piano. The music's gentle propulsion seems to be carried forward equally by all three players. Emotionally resonant, the warmth and clarity of ECM's high production standards captures every nuance -- even lightly struck cymbals resonate with incredible presence. --David Greenberger

Time Out NY, April 21, 2005
Gustavsen again demonstrates an enviable knack for penning compositions as simple, tuneful and seemingly inevitable as folk songs or hymns.

Stuart Nicholson, JazzTimes, May 2005
"The trio creates music rich with inner meaning and nuance."

Customer Reviews

Echt ECM
I'm not a huge fan of this kind of nouvelle-cuisine ECM piano trio music but it's hard to deny that this is an excellent example of the genre. The tempos and dynamics never get much more pulse-quickening than a slow simmer but they always have a pulse--there's plenty of space & pauses for reflection but this never turns into tempoless navel-gazing. The stylistic reference-points--jazz, gospel, Satie, pop, bossa, tango, the odd Spanish tinge, &c--are so abstracted & quietened down that they blur imperceptibly into each other. The tunes more or less run together too, ranging from melancholic languor to, er, languorous melancholy. This is mood music--but it's _good_ mood music.

Tord Gustavsen trio hits 'The Ground' running.
This CD has been blowing my mind for about two weeks now. I'm a big fan of ECM, I think they've been putting some really interesting jazz out there for awhile (Joe Maneri, Jan Garbarek, Charles Lloyd,Keith Jarrett, Dave Holland, etc.), and this is no exception. From the subtly glowing, out of focus album art, to the heart rending beauty of songs like 'Being There', and, 'Kneeling Down', through the slow drag of the intro to 'Curtains Aside', up to the brilliantly upbeat outro to 'The Edges of Happiness', this CD is amazing. It's solid all the way through, a perfect soundtrack for all kinds of activities, something to just sit down and let float through your mind too. Tord Gustavsen on Piano, Harald Johnsen on double bass, and Jarle Vespestad on drums. I am bowled over by this fantastic outing.
Just thought I'd share. I always like to spread the good jazz around.

A Sparkling Example of Taste!
I hardly have to mention (even though I will) that jazz is a beautiful art. It is a music that, when done right, "speaks to the gut" in ways that not many other musics can. Yet, much like trends in classical music, so much of the current jazz output is designed to appeal almost exclusively to the intellectual side of the coin; interesting progressions and chord scales, but not much else.

This is why I like the Tord Gustavsen Trio, and this CD, so much. Here, Gustavsen and company have really created music that goes straight for the gut. The music is beautifully understated; space between notes becomes as important as notes themselves. Tempos are slow and steady, but never quite languishing. And the compositions manage to combine the feel of romantic-era composers of Eastern Europe (Smetana, Dvorak) with a laid-back jazz sensibility.

The only complaint I have about the disc is that the barrage of slow, minor key tunes - no matter how beautiful each one is - could really have benefitted from some variation. It took me a few good listens to the CD before really getting used to it, and even then, I still tend not to listen to the whole disc in one sitting (preferring a few songs at a time).

Other than that, Gustavsen and company have produced a wonderful disc here. They are examples of taste - from the very unforgettable melodies they create to the melodicism with which thes solos are handled, "The Ground" sparkles.