Vassilis Tsabropoulos - Akroasis (2003)

Very lovely solo piano suite from Athens native Vassilis Tsabropoulos, previously featured here in trio format - see link below.  Akroasis is based on five traditional Byzantine hymns, which together with three of Tsabropoulos' own compostions "became a poem of eight pictures".  Enjoy just under 45 minutes of blissful piano poetry.

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Previously posted at SGTG: Achirana

Vassilis Tsabropoulos with Arild Andersen and John Marshall - Achirana (2000)

Greek pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos made his ECM debut with this October 1999 session, and he's since become an ever more exquisite composer and player.  He's first heard in this most modern-ECM of formats, the piano trio, subtly and with gentle understatement as the title track gets underway.  It's the first of two group improvisations, with the second, Diamond Cut Diamond, being much more alive and propulsive and proving this is a well-chosen trio that gelled really well in the studio.

From there, it becomes increasingly clear that the real group leader is probably Arild Andersen, as soon as he wraps a characteristically solid-oak-carved bassline around his composition Valley.  A further Andersen-penned track is She's Gone, based on a Norwegian folk song.  Throughout the rest of the material written by Tsabropoulous, Andersen plays some of his most sublime bass work, whilst the pianist carries on in gorgeously understated mode.  John Marshall proves to be a great sympathetic drummer throughout, making this one of the very best ECM piano trio albums.

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