Latest releases reviewed

RALPH REICHERT/RANDY SANDKE
Reflections
Nagel Heyer 
****

Trumpeter Sandke is in coruscating form, guesting with German tenor Reichert's quartet on this 2002 concert date in Hamburg, Nagel Heyer's home town. The lingua franca is bop tinged with mainstream, and the music is filled with that invigorating sense of a band on song. Reichert is a fluent, swinging tenor with a gorgeous tone and a fecund imagination, while the rhythm section - Buggy Braune (piano), Andreas Henze (bass) and Wolff Reichert (drums) - is ideal. Standards, spiced with Monk's Reflections and Mulligan's Bernie's Tune, neither played much nowadays, are the bill of fare, but the group serves them piping hot, with Darn That Dream, Nancy With The Laughing Face and It might As Well Be Spring notable features for trumpet, tenor and piano respectively. www.musicconnection.org.uk

CARATINI JAZZ ENSEMBLE
From The Ground
Le Chant du Monde
****

PUsing musicians drawn from l'Orchestre Imaginaire Ensemble Instrumental de Moselle to form a group with a range of colour from trumpets, reeds, trombones, french horns to tuba, rhythm and guests, bassist/composer Patrice Caratini offers five vastly different "suites" brimming with fresh ideas. There are hints in the title suite of Gil Evans, but Caratini ranges far and wide for his orchestral palette; Caribbean, jazz and classical influences are present, the last two especially in his addressing ways of combining classical sonorities with jazz, and blending the written with the improvised; there are also five short pieces for tuba and orchestra and a suite memorialising Django Reinhardt. Caratini is prodigal with his ideas; at times you wish he would develop them more before moving on, but it's a CD full of surprises, mostly good. www.harmoniamundi.com

ROSARIO GIULIANI
More Than Ever
Dreyfus
***

Heard here mostly on alto, Giuliani is the same player who performed so beautifully on Enrico Pieranunzi's Les amants, reviewed last week. Whether in a trio context, with Remi Vignolo (bass) and Benjamin Henocq (drums), or augmented on some tracks with Richard Galliano (accordion) or Jean-Michel Pilc (piano), he's a mix of Phil Woods and Coltrane. But he's clearly a brilliant musician, authoritative and inventive. The guests, especially Galliano, seem to bring the best out of him; good as Vignolo and Henocq are, without additional firepower around, the trio tracks lack the creative tension and excitement of the quartet and quintet performances. Giuliani's playing suggests he's going to be a truly outstanding jazzman; this is an interesting stopover along the way. www.dreyfusrecords.com