The Song Is You Enrico Rava & Fred Hersch

• 1 Retrato em Branco e Preto 07:54
• 2 Improvisation 04:17
• 3 I’m Getting Sentimental Over You 05:55
• 4 The Song Is You 04:45
• 5 Child’s Song 07:09
• 6 The Trial 02:09
• 7 Misterioso 06:47
• 8 Round Midnight 03:50
• Total Runtime 42:46

Info for The Song Is You

Their collaboration has been hailed as a summit meeting of two jazz masters. Enrico Rava, trumpeter from Trieste, and Fred Hersch, pianist from Cincinatti, share a deep affection for the tradition and a profound sense for melodic invention. In this recording, with flugelhorn and piano glowing in the superb acoustic of the Lugano studio, Rava and Hersch explore some much-loved standards: Jerome Kern’s “The Song Is You”, Thelonious Monk’s “Mysterioso” and “’Round Midnight”, Jobim’s “Retrato em Branco e Preto”, and George Bassman’s “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You”. They also play their own tunes, Fred’s “Child’s Song” and Enrico’s “The Trial”, and improvise freely together. Enrico Rava has been an ECM artist for almost fifty years. The Song Is You is Fred Hersch’s first for the label. The album was recorded at Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI in November 2021, and produced by Manfred Eicher.

The Song Is You documents the inspired meeting of two master improvisers. Italian trumpeter and flugelhornist Enrico Rava and US pianist Fred Hersch share a love of the music’s history and together explore standards including Jerome Kern’s “The Song Is You”, Thelonious Monk’s “Mysterioso” and “’Round Midnight”, Jobim’s “Retrato em Branco e Preto”, and George Bassman’s “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You”. They also play their own tunes, Fred’s “Child’s Song” and Enrico’s “The Trial”, and create music freely together. It’s a subtle and far reaching performance: when jazz reaches this level of understanding and interplay, a performance becomes less about the material – however distinguished it may be - than what the interpreter brings to it. Rava and Hersch bring vast experience and a finely honed sense of jazz improvisation as a storyteller’s art.

Enrico Rava has recorded for ECM since the 1970s, beginning with The Pilgrim And The Stars, now regarded as a modern jazz classic. The Song Is You is Fred Hersch’s first for the label, following albums as a leader with Nonesuch, Palmetto, Sunnyside and others. Throughout his long career as a player, Hersch has returned very often, to duo instrumentation. In his memoir Good Things Happen Slowly he reflects upon his preference for the format: “The duo suited my ability to use the entire keyboard to do multiple things at once. It also let me orchestrate the music instead of just playing block chords with the left hand. (..) I indulged my love of spontaneous counterpoint – two or more independent melodic lines going on simultaneously. I can go from roaring loud to pianissimo instantly. It’s collaborative and also intimate. You have to be compatible but also different enough for each musician to offer something unique.” (Enrico’s discography also includes some notable duos, including The Third Man with Stefano Bollani).

The November 2021 recording of The Song Is You followed just a handful of Italian dates earlier that year. But from first of these it was evident that something special was happening. Fred Hersch: “One of the things that I really liked from the beginning was that Enrico doesn’t feel like he has to be soloing. It’s not as clearly defined. We make things together,” Fred told interviewer Nicola Ferrauto. “He lets me get in there and push him a little bit. Other times I might give him a lot of space. The best duo partnerships are the ones where you don’t have to talk about it too much. You just play. And I’m getting the feeling this is going to be a long partnership. It’s really very simpatico, and Enrico’s a great master.”

Enrico Rava, flugelhorn
Fred Hersch, piano

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Booklet for The Song Is You