Emile Parisien: Floating

French soprano saxophonist Emile Parisien is a leading light in French and European jazz. Equally at home in contemporary chamber jazz, free improvisation and more traditional settings, he has developed a distinctive musical language shaped by a wide range of collaborators and influences.

Floating is the first release from a quartet that emerged from the closing concert of Parisien's two-year residency at the Cité Internationale in Paris. Intended as a one-off performance, the rapport between the musicians was obvious from the outset. As Parisien recalls, "At the end of that magnificent first concert, we immediately realized that we couldn't just let the story end there."

Fewer than 12 months and only two further concerts later, Parisien, pianist Yaron Herman, bassist Linda May Han Oh and tabla player Prabhu Edouard convened in the studio for a two-day session that produced Floating. The programme mixes nine originals with two well-chosen covers, with the compressed recording schedule enabling them to capture the spontaneity of that first concert.

Having worked with musicians as diverse as Michael Wollny, Theo Croker and Vincent Peirani, Parisien can offer a brand of chamber music that is not a natural fit for any specific category. The opening "Asian Songs & Rhythms, No. 40" composed by spiritual teacher Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff and classical composer Thomas de Hartmann, establishes the quartet's sound world immediately, its cyclical pulse providing the framework for fluid, conversational improvising between Parisien and Herman.

Parisien's "Bonbon" follows with Edouard's tabla propelling the music with restless energy, while the leader responds with a soaring, agile solo. "Olive Branch" offers one of the album's most memorable melodies before Anouar Brahem's "Badhra" allows Parisien and Herman to develop their intuitive dialogue and improvisational ideas.

The quartet shifts gears on "Portal," where Edouard introduces the piece with rapid, wordless vocalizations that add another rhythmic layer before reappearing on "El Toro." Throughout, Oh's bass provides the music with its quiet center of gravity, nowhere more evident than on her elegantly poised solo performance on her composition "As It Comes And As It Goes," while her contribution to "66" proves equally compelling. Herman's lyrical touch comes to the fore on "Ruth," while "Nusrat" is full of driving, rhythmic momentum.

Parisien's playing is of the highest order throughout, but Floating succeeds because it never feels leader-centric. Instead, it is the quartet's interplay together with their willingness to leave space and ignore boundaries that gives the music its character. This is a wholly satisfying debut from a group whose story, fortunately, did not end with that first concert.