Ethan Cohn and Sebastian Greschuk share a strong musical connection. They’re talking about using these same musicians for future projects. That bodes well for us listeners.
Ears & Eyes Records
Ethan Cohn -Bass; Sebastian Greschuk – Trumpet, Flugelhorn, Valve Trombone; Tatiana Nova – vocals; Yakiv Tsvietinskyi – Trumpet, Flugelhorn, Trombone; Joshua Schofield – Alto Saxophone; Gianni Gagliardi – Tenor, Soprano Saxophone; Lorenzo Vitolo – Piano; Aron Talas – Drums, Moog Synthesizer, Fender Rhodes
ENSEMBLE INFINITY consists of eight jazz musicians from three different continents. The idea for this octet started when bassist Ethan Cohn and trumpeter Sebastian Greschuk attended the Focusyear residency program in Basel, Switzerland. Nine students receive a full scholarship. It covers tuition and the cost of living so students can focus just on music.
Ethan Cohn was born and raised in New York City. As a child he played classical music on the cello. He discovered his true love of music when he started playing bass and guitar along with his favorite records.
Trumpeter Sebastian Greschuk is from Argentina. He’s studied and played with some of the jazz greats like Conrad Herwig, Tim Berne, Barry Harris, and Ralph Alessi.
Cohn and Greschuk were impressed with each other’s writing. Besides jazz they both liked folk, rock, and avant garde music. Cohn wrote five of the tunes on ENSEMBLE INFINITY, Greschuk wrote three.
Russian born Tatiana Nova is a wonderful singer based in Germany. She’s present on every cut of ENSEMBLE INFINITY. It’s uncanny how well she blends her wordless singing with the horn section. I think this technique is overused here.
It makes too many parts of the album sound the same. On the other hand when someone solos it really makes that solo stand out.
Tatiana sings words on ‘Bound To You ’and it makes you wonder why she sings on just the one song. She has a beautiful voice. I like her phrasing. There’s a child-like feeling to the song that’s very charming. Lorenzo Vitolo’s piano intros ‘Bound To You ’making it sound like a lullaby. Aron Talas’s brushwork on drums is very tasty.
Sebastian Greschuk shares a brotherhood with fellow trumpeter Yakiv Tsvietinskyi. Yakov’s from Ukraine and in the middle of the war Greschuk went to visit and perform with him.
Tsvietinskyi plays flugelhorn on ‘Bosque’ and trades improvisations with Greschuk’s trumpet.
Joshua Schofield has a nice west-coast-cool alto sax solo on ‘Luna’s Lullaby.’
Gianni Gagliardi throws out a mean tenor sax solo on ‘Ladina Oswald.’ It’s fast, loud, a little dissonant and it’s good!
Ethan Cohn and Sebastian Greschuk share a strong musical connection. They’re talking about using these same musicians for future projects. That bodes well for us listeners.
