Johnsen / Sahlander / Moen & - Second Time´s The Charm (CD)

Release Date: 02/05/21

Contemporary piano trio jazz with a nod to the classic standards.

Bernt Moen´s thoughts about some of the songs:

'The Intro' Well, for me, it is always a struggle to name my compositions, but in this case, it was easy. It's the intro. It is based around four chords and somehow turned into a Giant Stepsish version when Fredrik started to do his thing.

'Solar' I came up with the idea of a bassline that was really laidback and we just went with it. I think we did it in one take, just deciding on the tempo and key beforehand.

'A Foggy Day'. This is one of the first 'standards' I learned, and I remember my piano teacher was quite unimpressed, I´ve never been good at Bebop and he was all about Bebop, so.... But I wanted to revisit this composition and take it in a whole new direction. The melody lends itself very easily to reharmonization and I did an arrangement based mostly on minor chords and tonal centers being moved around the melody. The right feel was there when we played it and this ended up being our take on 'A Foggy Day' and I feel that I got some closure on my previous experiences with this composition.

'Bemsha Swing' This is a composition that I really like! Nobody did it like Monk and there was no point in trying to copy the way he played his compositions and the piano in general, so I wanted to take it in another direction and give the arrangement a sense of a laidback, chill, groovy feel.

'Autumn Leaves' Well, are there any jazz musicians that have not played this composition? I love the melody and wanted to take it in a different direction than what it is usually performed. I wrote a bassline that Fredrik and I play in unison and the arrangement is strict, but that was also the idea behind the arrangement.

'Giant Steps' A 7/8-time signature and based around two chords? Well, why not? We all had fun with the arrangement, going all over the place before the melody was introduced in the end. It also hints back to the first track on the album.

Bernt Moen - piano
Fredrik Sahlander - bass
Geir Johnsen - drums