This edition of Jazz al Piccolo begins with a special preview: a concert by an ecceptional trio - Enrico Intra, Paolino Dalla Porta, and Mattia Cigalini(photograph by Roberto Morelli – www.arteimmagine.it) – which unites three musicians from different generations, all three active participants on the contemporary scene and together for almost four years.
It is an original project, with roots in the aesthetics of jazz, producing however a music which forms part of the trends of European and contemporary jazz. A group with a chamber set-up which has, however, a wide dynamic range which runs from a whisper to peaks of great expressive intensity, leaving ample space for improvised dialogue between the musicians, based on a constant reciprocal listening and the most audacious improvisation.
The repertoire of the group is based on new or recent compositions by Intra, Dalla Porta and Cigalini, with an open style and a strong dynamic.
Mattia Cigalini is part of the generation of the twenty-year-olds of Italian jazz, but he has already reached an expressive and compositional maturity which renders him a true rising star on the European scene.
Paolino Dalla Porta represents the generation of the fifty-year-olds, artistically born in the 1980s and subsequently reaching heights of creativity as to take their places at the summit of the national scene.
Last but not least, Enrico Intra, who just recently celebrated his 80th birthday, would be a representative of modern Italian jazz history if his boundless creative vein and his extraordinary vitality didn't place him among the most original and cutting edge of European musicians.
Their taste for musical adventure and for improvisation, sometimes total, has rendered necessary the recording of the first album of this singular group during a live concert, a situation which best captures its characteristics.