Danielsson, Pohjola, Parricelli: 'Trio'

What a beautiful album this is - a jazz trio doing what they do best, recorded in the calm of a beautiful chateau with no sheet music and no screens.

I've known the music of John Parricelli for many years (we're a similar age and our paths crossed several times through the 1980s, particularly on my brief appearance with the outstanding Loose Tubes) and it is truly wonderful to hear his guitar with Lars Danielsson's bass and Verneri Pohjola's trumpet.

The simply-named Trio was not recorded in a studio, but in a wood-panelled salon alongside the winemaking in France's Chateau Palmer - the second such collaboration for the winery and ACT Music. The inaugural album in 2023 was a duet between jazz pianists Michael Wollny and Joachim Kühn and was as equally delightful as the Chateau's wine (so I am told!) and this trio.

Lars Danielsson saw the challenge of recording away from a traditional studio setting as “an opportunity to propose a new formula, something new, to experiment with a new combination of instruments, new compositions, a new dimension.” The result is succulent, simple and evocative in this beautiful French setting.

He added: “Just as you don’t have to drink the whole bottle to appreciate a wine, I don’t think you have to reveal everything for music to be appreciated. The compositions generate their own dynamic. I didn’t need to give Verneri and John any instructions. I preferred that everyone feel free within the proposed framework.”

There is something definitively French and certainly European about all the tracks on this album, and the setting for the recording provokes a particular interpretation of the three covers, including the marvellous rendition of Duke Ellington’s Mood Indigo.

A beautiful album, this deserves to be enjoyed at leisure, perhaps with a choice bottle of Burgundy at hand.