For me, 2025 was the year of the piano trio. I spent countless hours chilling my soul to the likes of Bill Evans in particular, but kept my eye and ear out for contemporary examples of the form, too. My favorite of the lot is Julian Shore Trio’s Sub Rosa. It’s by turns startling and soothing, in some ways cryptic (as hinted at by the album title) and in others crystal clear, and it’s turned into one of my favorite albums of the year.
Pianist and composer Julian Shore is a rising star in the New York jazz scene. He teaches privately at the New School, through the New York Jazz Academy, has performed with a who’s who of contemporary and cutting edge musicians in many genres, and has appeared at top venues and festivals in the U.S. and around the globe. He and his trio mates, bassist Martin Nevin and drummer Allan Mednard, play with the kind of fluid chemistry that is a hallmark of all the best trios.
Shore’s most incisive compositions on Sub Rosa are an homage to saxophonist Wayne Shorter, a musical hero of Shore’s who he studied with briefly at Berklee College of Music. (The members of Shorter’s revered quartet – Danilo Perez, John Patitucci and Brian Blade – have all become mentors and collaborators of Shore’s as well.) The opening track “Messenger” a simmering melange of textures marked by sharp bursts of clarity, refers to Shorter’s tenure in the renowned Jazz Messengers, and the second “Mission” is a lightly soulful remembrance of the saxophonist, and the album closes with a short excerpt of his “Pegasus.”
The trio shows its chops and Shore his talent for arrangement on some well chosen covers including Duke Ellington’s “Blues In Blueprint,” a lesson in abstraction based on a simple form; a romantic trip through the Beach Boys’ “Don’t Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)” and a highly abstracted romp through the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein standard “All The Things You Are.”
This trio fires on all cylinders on two of Shore’s more upbeat compositions. “Must Keep Going” blends contemporary and classical stylings with some pointed avant garde passages, with drummer Mednard displaying a sharp melodic sense, adding layers of texture and color to the piano’s lines. And once “Winter Song” hits its pace following a rubato intro, the bass and drums set up a rhythmic crossfire through which Shore drops tinkling melodies like the melting of icicles.
Or that’s the images and feelings it evokes in me. Shore and Co. on Sub Rosa revel in the clandestine, suggesting but never explaining fully. It’s the kind of album that will be revealing ever expanding meaning for a long time to come. (Oh, and the artwork is a cool abstract/realist painting by Shore’s mother, artist Tayo Heuser.)
Play Ballads, a superb collection of deeply explored covers of standard ballads landed on my desk toward the end of the year and quickly stole a piece of my heart. The Danish trio of pianist Carsten Dahl, bassist Lennart Ginman, and drummer Thomas Blachman lays down 15 tunes in their signature style, playing these familiar pieces in recognizable form but in a way that makes you see and hear them from all kinds of new angles.
The trio approaches these standards in what I’m told is their signature style, which is described as contemplative. If that means they’re investing thought and feeling in their interpretations, I’d have to agree. Many of these favorites are played at deliberately slow tempos, which allow the trio to explore each tune, sometimes each chord and note, very deliberately, and it pays off for the listener.
One of the first things I noticed when listening to this trio play ballads was that Carsten Dahl is obviously a big Ellington fan, which shows in both his rhythmic attack and his melodic approach. That was even before I got to what’s my favorite track, a languidly dramatic take on the Duke’s “Satin Doll.” The album is rife with Ellingtonia: in addition to “Satin Doll” you’ll find the Duke’s “C Jam Blues” and “Come Sunday,” his son Mercer Ellington’s “Things Ain’t What They Used to Be,” and Billy Strayhorn’s “Take the ‘A’ Train” and “Chelsea Bridge.” Those latter three were popularized during the 1941 ASCAP strike when Duke’s records couldn’t be played on the radio.
The rest of the program is a bit of a deep dive into the Songbook: A couple of Jimmy Van Heusen romantic ballads, “But Beautiful” (popularized by Bing Crosby) and “Here’s That Rainy Day”; the dramatic “Gone With The Wind” (which was inspired by Margaret Mitchell’s book but predates the movie); an absolutely haunting “Angel Eyes” as the opening track; a droll “Blue Monk”; and a very hard hitting take on Nat Adderley’s “Work Song.” And much more. Highly recommended for lovers of both modern jazz and standards.
Reckless Meter is my first exposure to the music of the Colorado sextet Convergence. From just listening to this one I pictured a youngish ensemble playing swinging modern jazz with a lot of verve, but, well, Convergence has been at the forefront of the intermountain region jazz scene for more than 30 years! The group photo on the CD booklet tells the story: these are all mature dudes with a lot of music under their belts and in their hearts.
The eight tracks on this superbly recorded and mixed live set are all originals by group members: Eric Gunnison (piano), Greg Gisbert (trumpet and flugelhorn), John Gunther (saxophones), Mark Patterson (trombone), Mark Simon (bass), and Paul Romaine (drums). The music is modern but melodic, with a lot of swing coming out of that rhythm section and delicious harmonies from the horns. If there’s anything that sounds better to my ears than a trumpet and sax mixing unison and harmony lines, it’s when you add a trombone to the mix!
The set opens enticingly with the deeply swinging blues of the mid-tempo “Big Boot” and the upbeat “Springaling,” both of which revel in chewy harmonics from the horns. They step away from their bluesy swing on the cinematic “Cauldron,” which features the piano, bass and drums right up front in a subversively cool intro, then kick into a roiling head section from the horns before shifting to a series of potboiling solos. The closing title track “Reckless Meter” veers into prog/fusion territory with playful Zappa-esque arpeggios. In between are a couple of ballads, the romantic “Margaret Clara” and the upbeat, exploratory “Coyote Moon.” There’s not a dull moment on this date; the cats of Convergence know how to grab an audience by the ears and hold on.
I was nearly alone in not placing guitarist Mary Halvorson’s About Ghosts on my list of favorite jazz albums of 2025, having much preferred her 2024 release Cloudward. Fortunately, there was no dearth of ways to enjoy Halvorson’s particular genius in 2025, including a strong supporting role on trombonist Kalia Vandever’s Another View.
This is (I think) Vandever’s third recording as a leader and first on Northern Spy. On it, she blends a strong sense of both melody and harmony into a dark melange of largely unsettling music with a strong element of the experimental, inspired in part by Carmen Maria Machado’s memoir In the Dream House. Assisting in realizing her vision in addition to Halvorson are Kanoa Mendenhall (bass) and Kayvon Gordon (drums), providing a foundation for some far-reaching improvisations by the guitarist and trombonist.
The album opens with “Staring At The Cracked Window” featuring a lengthy improvised introduction on Halvorson’s phase-shifting guitar. Vandever in the liner notes says this song “…was written with resilience in mind, specifically the will to break free from a harmful cycle. The character of this piece is hopeful, yet emerging from a darkness that evolves throughout the album. I was drawing from cyclical patterns while writing the music on Another View and imagining the gradual dissolution of these patterns. The album brings you into a fractured dream state and releases you into a renewed sense of reality.”
In places Vandever draws on trance-like repitition to create an aura of mania or paranoia, particularly the introductions to “Withholding” and “Unearth What You Already Knew,” and elsewhere employing a menacing style of classical-influenced composition to unsettle, especially the arco bass-trombone duet that opens “Cycle In Mourning.” The set does end on a somewhat more upbeat or even hopeful note with the clear-eyed “In My Dream House.” Throughout, the interplay between the offbeat sensibilities of Vandever and Halvorson is never short of mesmerising.
(Chill Tone, 2025)
(Storyville Records, 2025)
(Capri Records, 2025)
(Northern Spy, 2025)
