Sketches of Seasons

Jazz pianist Atzko Kohashi is a continuing source of amazement for me—she is so versatile, so flexible! Here, she partners with percussionist Eddy Koopman to create an album of great nuance and immersive engagement. Riffing off the theme of four seasons, the artists weave a tapestry of sound across the four movements of the album. As always, Atzko Kohashi's touch is delicate, deliberate, carefully calibrated to the emotional content she wishes to convey. Eddy Koopman brings a similar delicacy and intention with his use of bells, brushed gongs and cymbals, and drums of all types... Kohashi's magical touch keeps all moving ahead, weaving the melody and enticing one to follow along.

The recording is filled with detail and color. One clearly hears the stroke on drum skin, the deep resonance of larger drums, the sharp percussive strikes on wood, the reverberation of piano strings above the sound board—it is deliciously close to being live. This is a tour de force in recording quality that captures the full resonance and timbre of an exceptionally wide range of both piano and percussion instruments.

Thunder and lightning, stillness and élan, heavenly and earthly, an adventurous journey to the rhythm of the tides.

These two open minds know how to enliven and musically shape the seasons in their own unique way.