Circles Luca Mannutza

• 1 CIRCLES 09:40
• 2 METAMORPHO 09:14
• 3 D-ISOLATION 06:57
• 4 BLACK COMEDY 03:25
• 5 HERZOG 08:06
• 6 DECEMBER 09:04
• 7 VORTEX 06:44
• 8 THE END OF A LOVE AFFAIR 08:28
• Total Runtime 01:01:38

Info zu Circles

Cast your mind back to 2006 and Mario Biondi's masterpiece album Handful of Soul and this is where you would have encountered the genius of Luca Mannutza before. A member of the Blue Note Records released The High Five Project, which featured on Handful of Soul, Luca also acted as arranger for all the tracks on the album, including the worldwide smash hit This Is What You Are. Now, with Circles, The Luca Mannutzi Quintet adds to A.MA Records' superb catalogue with an album based on a profound understanding of harmonic and rhythmical exploration. Featuring covers of Bobby Hutcherson's goundbreaking Herzog and Bud Redding's consumate The End of the Affair this album is a must must for jazz efficianados and music collectors alike; indeed Circles is destined to become a classic in its genre.

Offered here as pre-order tracks, the Quintet excel on the title track and opener Circles and D- Isolation, as they do on across the eight song album. The line-up of Luca Mannutza on piano, Paolo Recchia on alto-sax, Jordan Corda on vibes, bassist Danielle Sorrentino and Sasha Mashin on drums takes on the compositions with a beautifully languourous, unhurried and relaxed expertise; both belying and enhancing the wonderfully complex arrangements presented here.

Liner Notes By Enrico Bracco: I've been hanging out and collaborating with Luca for several years, and I can say with absolute certainty that he's one of the most accomplished musicians I know; his ability to navigate the various jazz languages is astonishing. Despite his profound knowledge of tradition, his compositional universe has shifted in recent years toward a decidedly more contemporary approach. From this perspective, I can say that his focus on the contemporary music scene, both in New York and elsewhere, is so great that he's become a point of reference and a sort of promoter for many musicians. The tracks on this new album vividly reveal this research, based on a profound understanding of harmony—particularly evident in the song "D-Isolation"—and rhythm, such as the tracks "Circles" and the arrangement of the famous "End of a Love Affair," to name a few. The harmonic and rhythmic exploration is never a sterile exercise in style, but always functional to the development of a complex and far from banal melodic discourse, as for example in the three-quarter time piece "Vortex," a composition with a circular harmonic progression in the best tradition of 1960s post-tonal jazz.

We cannot fail to mention the fantastic musicians who manage to enhance everything with great mastery: Paolo Recchia on alto sax, the young talent Jordan Corda, a rising star on the vibraphone, Daniele Sorrentino and Sasha Mashin, an incredible rhythm section capable of dealing with the leader's compositional vicissitudes with ease and relaxation!

Luca Mannutza, piano
Paolo Recchia, alto saxophone
Jordan Corda, vibraphone
Daniele Sorrentino, double bass
Sasha Mashin, drums

Recorded March 2024 at La Strada Studio, Rome
Recording Engineered by Enrico Furzi
Mixed and mastering by Sasha Mashin
Produced by Sasha Mashin

Luca Mannutza
Born in Cagliari in 1968, he approached music at a very young age, thanks to his father who gave him his first piano lessons when he was only 4 years old. He began classical studies at the age of 6 and enrolled at the 'G.P. da Palestrina' school in Cagliari in 1979, where he graduated with excellent marks at the age of 18.

After years of various experiences, including with progressive rock and fusion groups, he approached jazz in 1990, indulging a natural predisposition for improvisation and creativity. The intensity of his musical activity in this field began to grow two years later, when he started playing with Argentinian saxophonist Hector Costita and met New York trumpeter Andy Gravish, with whom he still collaborates.

In 1993 he also began performing alongside the best Italian jazz musicians, including Paolo Fresu, Emanuele Cisi, Maurizio Giammarco and Bebo Ferra. Among the important awards received in the jazz competitions in which he took part at the beginning of his career, we can mention the Ennio Porrino Prize (1981), the special mention of the jury at the Barga Jazz competition (2000), the first prize in the Massimo International Prize Urbani (2002), in the Audience Award at the International Tramplin Jazz Competition in Avignon, France, as a member of the quartet of saxophonist Max Ionata (2002). Furthermore, in 2002 in Paris, he qualified for the final phase of the Martial Solal International Competition, the most prestigious jazz competition dedicated to the piano.

In addition to performing as a soloist on the piano, he plays in a duo with saxophonist Max Ionata and in a duo with drummer Lorenzo Tucci (duo Lunar), in a trio with Luca Bulgarelli and Nicola Angelucci; he is also co-director of the quintet Sound Advice with Andy Gravish, in which Marcello di Leonardo, Luca Bulgarelli and Max Ionata take part, and directs a sextet, Sound Six, with Max Ionata, Andy Gravish, Paolo Recchia, Andrea Nunzi and Renato Gattone .

Since 2002 he has been part of many important projects of drummer Roberto Gatto, with whom he has performed in numerous concerts internationally and made recordings for several albums. Since 2002 he has collaborated steadily with Fabrizio Bosso, as an organist and pianist, and is a member of the High Five, the group most representative of Italian jazz success in the world, sales champions with the album Five for Fun (Blue Note / EMI Italia 2007 ) and Handful of Soul (Schema 2006) together with Mario Biondi. Also noteworthy is the collaboration with the American trumpeter Jeremy Pelt. Luca Mannutza combines his intense live activity with that of arranger for various artists and recording projects, such as Mario Biondi, Rosalia de Souza, Filippo Tirincanti, Lorenzo Tucci.

Luca Mannutza has played in the most important Italian jazz clubs (Torrione Jazz Club, Panic Jazz Club, Cantina Bentivoglio, Alexanderplatz, Blue Note Milano, Pinocchio Jazz Club and many others) and around the world (Blue Note Tokyo, Blue Note Osaka, Sunset and Sunside Paris, Bimhuis Amsterdam, Pizza Express London, Smoke New York, Fat Cat New York) and has participated in numerous events and festivals as a guest of prestigious institutions such as the Casa del Jazz (Rome), Umbria Jazz, Villacelimontana jazz. , Moncalieri Jazz, Pescara Jazz Festival, Ancona Jazz Summer Festival, Roma Jazz Festival, Form and Poetry in Jazz (Cagliari), Bologna Jazz Festival, Padova Jazz Festival, Gray Cat Festival, I hate summer Festival, Vicenza Jazz, Crossroads Festival and many others in Italy and around the world (Italian Jazz in New York, Shanghai 2010, Jakarta Jazz Festival, Dubai Jazz Festival, Parc Floral Paris, Italian Jazz in Beijing). He has played with the most important Italian and foreign jazz musicians (Rava, Fresu, Bosso, Boltro, Tamburini, Amato, Scannapieco, Cisi, Giammarco, Bonisolo, Giuliani, DiBattista, Gatto, Sferra, Bonaccorso, B.Casini, Ferra, J. . Pelt, J.Frahm, S.Grossman, J.D. Allen, G.Cleaver, D.Burno,B.Hart) and many others.

Many newspapers and major specialized magazines (Jazzit, Musica Jazz, Swing Journal, Jazz Magazine, All About Jazz) have reviewed his recordings and praised their qualities.​

Dieses Album enthält kein Booklet