07/01/'07
Robin Hilary Ashe-Roy
NUKLEUS
JAZZ TRIO
ATHENS CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR 2006/2007
Arriving in Athens with my flute and a few clothes I decided to investigate the local jazz scene and having talked on the phone with the promoter of the Parafono Jazz Club decided on his advice to check out Nukleus on Boxing Day night.
Entering an archetypal upstairs club dimly lit with all the atmosphere one would expect I got talking with the bass player, Pericles who welcomed me and introduced me to Yannis the drummer and eventually Sámi the pianist. There were no edges to any of them and was told that I could sit in with them in the second set.
At about 11pm, to a packed smokey club, the band struck up with some hard-edged post bop phrases clearly seducing the audience into their virtuosic world embroidered by musicianship of the highest order. At that level technique is almost a given but the ability to cross-reference that into a polymetric, polyrhythmic thunder of the gods is simply heroic.
All three musicians sung with one voice - many minds, one voice. The timbres of the drums filled the club with impressive resonances which interplayed with the virtuoso Sámi on piano who split the air with lightening right hand arpeggios while Pericles' bass galloped with dexterous movement - wow those blisters man!
To go to Greece and experience quality of that magnitude is not something to be scoffed at. People with a cynical pronouncement on life and jazz in particular should pay heed to what is happening in this part of the world paying special attention to the home-grown talent on the door step. Quality music is an art, which transcends geography, history spatial and temporal frames giving those who listen, something that they will remember all their lives. The Athenian promoters would do well to pay heed to this fact and pay attention to the world which is going on around them. To be fair this is not just a Greek phenomenon but also one which is seen nearly everywhere. "Can't see the wood for the Trees". This band can play hard and fast but also is able to exhibit talents in the ballad genre finding space and time for sonorous chords to dominate and act as staging posts for imaginative improvisations. A Chopin arrangement and a Richie Beirach tune hit the necessary harmonies in juxtaposition to the furious modal playing which had gone on before.
I managed to play with this band on two occasions and was given the ride of my life finding time to weave above the fast tempos of some standards - it all felt so natural without being forced; the key was listening, quiet a rarity these days where hundreds are being churned out from music colleges without having being taught to listen.
On my return to other parts of Europe not only is it the passion that is Greece but the down to earth no nonsense persona of the musicians, which I will keep with me.
Robin Hilary Ashe-Roy, Flautist. 2007
London
session 26/12/06 and 02/01/07 with guest: Robin Hilary Ashe-Roy flaute
Photos: Nicolas Nukleus Session 26.02.'06
Nukleus Session 1. Set 02.01.'07
Download_PDF print version NUKLEUS JAZZ TRIO by Robin Hilary Ashe-Roy 125 KB
NUKLEUS JAZZ TRIO
ΑΘΗΝΑ, ΧΡΙΣΤΟΥΓΕΝΝΑ ΚΑΙ ΝΕΟ ΕΤΟΣ 2006/2007_του Robin Hilary Ashe-Roy
Greek 15.01.'07
Συνέντευξη των Nukleus στο περιοδικό "Δίφωνο"