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Whereas Michael Ragonese’s first album focused on horn arrangements, his latest album, “Stracci”, features a stripped down trio that better showcases his formidable skills as a pianist. Joining Michael on this new effort are the very versatile Mark Ferber on drums and Luca Alemanno on bass. Michael sites several contemporary post bop pianists as influences, including Gerald Clayton, Josh Nelson, Vijay Iyer and Brad Mehldau. You can also hear traces of Keith Jarret, Paul Bley and Theolonious Monk in his playing too. Mark is a very free range drummer, often displaying a non-conventional approach to the trap set in a Paul Motion style, while Luca’s bass has the flexibility to tie all of this together. Roughly this album falls into the contemporary post bop genre, but you will also hear influences from romantic classical, art pop, fusion and free jazz as well.
The album opens with a cover of Miles’ “Solar”, which is given a very modern and truncated melody before going into a more standard post bop groove. This is the cut on which Raogonese displays a Paul Bley style relentless and muscular stream of right hand soloing. The next two tracks allow a lot of room for Ferber’s free approach to the drums as the other two act as anchors allowing him to play the drums as an almost lead instrument. On “Tides of Tomorrow Pt.2”, Michael solos over a prog rock style chord progression recalling his favorite contemporary pianist, the aforementioned Mehldau. “I’ll be Seeing You” is the other standard on this album of mostly originals and shows a very ‘Monkian’ approach to soloing with plenty of obtuse and persistent figures built around the whole tone scale. On this track, Luca adds his most swinging solo on the bass.
Without breaking down every single track on the album, rest assured that “Stracci” represents much of what is current in today’s jazz world while also maintaining a personal vision and personal musicality.