Anat Fort Trio - And If [CD]

'And If' is the second ECM album by Israeli pianist/composer Anat Fort who made many friends with her ECM debut A Long Story issued in 2007. The new recording focuses attention on her New York-based trio with Gary Wang and Roland Schneider, which recently celebrated its 10th anniversary as a working band. The musical emphasis is on ballads and clearly delineated melodies, making it an extremely attractive, and highly-accessible, recording, with the potential to reach a wide audience. <p>'Where A Long Story' put much focus on guest players Paul Motian and Perry Robinson, the subject of 'And If' is very much the Fort/Wang/Schneider trio. Themes and solos, written sections and improvisations flow seamlessly together in elegant and seemingly egoless jazz. Of especial interest is the portrait piece entitled "Paul Motian", a dedication to the great drummer, which appears in two variations at the beginning and end of the album. The striking cover photo shows the desert by the Red Sea, a hint of the spirit-of-place that informs the work, its sparseness an effective metaphor for the music.</p> <p>Anat Fort was born near Tel Aviv and studied classical piano as a child. Also improvising and writing her own tunes from an early age she naturally gravitated toward jazz, although her pieces were also steeped, from the outset, in the colours and atmospheres of the Middle East. Formative influences included Bill Evans, Paul Bley, Keith Jarrett and "very much of the music on ECM" which she heard first as a teenager in the late 1980s. In the mid-1990s she went to the USA to study jazz, wanting to balance a natural tendency towards freer playing with a proper understanding of the tradition. In the last several years she has become an influential figure on NYC's alternative jazz scene, but is also a highly regarded player in her homeland. She now splits her time between Israel and the US.</p> <p>Personnel: Anat Fort (piano), Gary Wang (double-bass), Roland Schneider (drums)</p>