Third Reel Third Reel

• 1 After All 01:19
• 2 Furious Seasons 05:08
• 3 Orbits 06:44
• 4 Improvisation 2 02:13
• 5 Bley 01:13
• 6 Neuer Mond Prologue 02:21
• 7 Improvisation 5 01:44
• 8 Miserere 03:22
• 9 Freeze 03:30
• 10 Fasten 03:26
• 11 Ginkgo 02:58
• 12 Sparrow 04:58
• 13 Spectrum 04:49
• 14 Eleventh Winter Tale 03:36
• 15 Improvisation 4 01:32
• 16 Neuer Mond 04:28
• Total Runtime 53:21

Info for Third Reel

Als Musikerkollektiv, das vor kreativem Potential strotzt, packt Third Reel reichlich musikalische Information in die sechzehn lebhaft-expressiven Tracks seines Debütalbums. Nicolas Masson, Roberto Pianca und Emanuele Maniscalco, sind alle engagierte Improvisatoren und gleichzeitig begabte Komponisten, jeder mit einer klar erkennbaren Handschrift. die daraus resultierenden Kontraste und das allen gemeinsame feine Gespür für den musikalischen Raum geben der Gruppe ihre klangliche Identität. Alle Mitglieder des Schweizerisch-Italienischen Trios unterhalten auch noch eigene Bands, aber Third Reel stellt für jeden die Priorität dar. Von beginn an als Trio ohne Bass angelegt – „das bedeutet für jeden Mitspieler mehr Verantwortung, aber erfordert auch mehr Risikobereitschaft“ – erprobte Third Reel zunächst verschiedene Schlagzeuger bis Pianca 2010 schließlich Emanuele Maniscalco (mit der er zuvor in der Band Food Chain zusammengearbeitet hatte) in die Gruppe brachte. Eine ausgedehnte Europatournee ist für Oktober und November in Planung.

Nicolas Masson, tenor saxophone, clarinet
Roberto Pianca, guitar
Emanuele Maniscalco, drums

Recorded February 2012
Auditorio Radiotelevisione svizzera, Lugano
Engineer: Lara Persia, RSI
Mixed October 2012 by Manfred Eicher and Lara Persia
Album produced by Manfred Eicher

Emanuele Maniscalco
Born in Brescia in 1983, and largely self-taught, Emanuele Maniscalco took up piano at eight and drums at twelve. While still in his teens he impressed Enrico Rava at a gig in Siena, was drafted into the trumpeter’s workshop band, and ended up drumming regularly with Enrico between 2004 and 2007. He has also played extensively with Stefano Battaglia and occasionally with other leading figures of the new Italian jazz scene, such as Stefano Bollani, Gianluca Petrella, and Giovanni Guidi (he played on Guidi’s critically-heralded trio album “Tomorrow Never Knows”). In recent years he has recommitted himself to the piano and today splits his time between the two instruments. Maniscalco’s current projects include a new duo with US bassist Thomas Morgan. His albums as a leader on other labels include “From Time To Time – The Music of Paul Motian” for El Gallo Rojo Records.

Guitarist Roberto Pianca,
whose palette, in Third Reel, embraces thick post-Hendrix distortion as well as delicate Jim Hall filigree, was born in 1984. He studied at the Scuola di Musica Moderna in Lugano and the Amsterdam Conservatory and privately in New York with saxophonist John O'Gallagher and pianist Russ Lossing. Active in jazz, contemporary classical, folk and rock contexts he has played and worked with a wide variety of artists including Joey Baron, Savina Yannatou, Sienna Dahlen, Yuri Goloubev, Jake Saslow, Colin Stranahan, Ben Syversen, Flin Van Hemmen, Dan Kinzelman, Stefano Senni, Otto Tausk, Wiek Hijmans, Tim Brady, Seth Josel and many others.

Nicolas Masson,
born 1972, dived into improvised music at the deep end, at 20 encountering Cecil Taylor and J. R. Mitchell in New York and subsequently studying with Frank Lowe and Makanda Ken McIntyre. “It gave me insights into the relationship of free playing and the jazz tradition that might otherwise have been difficult to access as a European.” Back in Geneva he studied at the Conservatoire Populaire de Musique and took masterclasses with Lee Konitz, Dave Douglas and Misha Mengelberg. Most of his own bands have been international in line-up and he made his recording debut as a leader with his New York quartet with Russ Johnson, Eivind Opsvik and Mark Ferber. Later incarnations of the quartet featured Gerald Cleaver and Ted Poor. His band Parallels with Colin Vallon, Patrice Moret and Lionel Friedli recorded for Clean Feed in 2009, and the following year, he assembled a new band with Ben Monder, Patrice Moret and Ted Poor. A leading figure on the Swiss new jazz scene, Masson has worked with a broad international cast of musicians including Kenny Wheeler, Josh Roseman, Kris Davis, Otomo Yoshihide, Tom Arthurs, Scott DuBois and many more. Masson’s bold and resolute tenor sax variously fronts Third Reel’s sound, hews closely to the guitar lines or agitates inside the group texture. “In this group you can take chances and know that you can trust your colleagues to support you and develop the musical ideas that arise.”

Booklet for Third Reel