Pierre de Bethmann – Agapé

After “Credo” in 2024, this is Pierre de Bethmann’s second opus with the same quartet.

A major quartet completed by David El Malek on tenor sax, Simon Tailleu on double bass and Antoine Paganotti on drums.

All four are at the service of the leader’s compositions, whose luminous pen produces little gems of remarkable melodic and harmonic density.

What’s immediately striking about this album is the way the quartet sculpts the sound with refinement and extreme attention to detail.

Each instrument chisels out a specific sonority, and the aggregate of the four timbres produces a delectable sound mass in which the piano and tenor solos unfurl subtle melodic volutes. Pierre de Bethmann‘s talents have been known for ages. Here, they are magnificently showcased in harmonically solid compositions and inspired solos in which his touch is a marvel.

David El Malek, for his part, offers lyrical flights, sometimes pugnacious, sometimes dreamier, which he sometimes deploys in parallel with the piano, and the rhythmic pair accompanies these soloists in subtle or tonic fashion. One of the special features of this recording is that de Bethmann adds discreet synthesizer layers or swirls to certain themes, which fit in very well with the acoustic context of the whole.

This is a very fine recording by a musician whose best is always expected, and who knows how to surround himself admirably to give life to the themes he composes.