Danny Grissett: Travelogue

On Travelogue, pianist Danny Grissett leads a trio through a rich set of performances distinguished by his evocative themes, diverse song structures, and lovely, dancing approach to the keyboard. Grissett's inventive and highly interactive bandmates are drummer Bill Stewart and bassist Vicente Archer. This is the trio's third Grissett-led outing, and Archer has accompanied the pianist on all seven of the recordings he's led.

Grissett composed most of Travelogue's tracks. His tuneful compositions easily deliver on the promise of the album's title, each track offering a bespoke musical reflection on a setting that left an impression on him. The jazz standard, "Whisper Not," and the vocal standard, "Here's that Rainy Day," are apt additions to the program, as they also visit interior spaces, the latter metaphorically.

Grisset plays wonderfully throughout. He improvises fluidly and melodically, but also carefully, eschewing flash and flourish. He's partial here to winding single-note runs punctuated by consonant chords, and more interested in the piano's legato possibilities than in its percussive ones—with his tune "The After Hours" a satisfying exception. Grissett's graceful touch and dynamics recall Tommy Flanagan, among others.

"Long Way Home," the wonderful opening track, offers a serpentine theme accented by chiming chords, to which Grissett returns near the end. He constructs his solo around a lovely series of single note lines.

The delightfully titled "Wonder Wander" features another appealing melody. Stewart and Archer set up a playfully busy but supportive soundtrack for Grisset's solo. Here, and on several other tracks, the trio moves through discrete sections in which keys and rhythms shift. Near the beginning and the end of the tune, Grissett deploys a catchy, bass-heavy vamp, leveraging the appeal of repetition.

Something similar happens in "The People in the City:" While laying out his opening theme, Grissett introduces a sweet, seven-note phrase that he returns to, and generously repeats, near the end of the track.

Riffing on a feature of television remote controls, "Picture in Picture" situates a quick and alert stretch of playing—which would pair quite well with a suspenseful scene—between slower and more reflective opening and closing sections, in which Grissett makes liberal use of his sustain pedal.

Slinky Archer and Grissett vamps launch the album's most syncopated, head-nodding track, "The After Hours," which has the night-club vibe its title evokes.

In "Spin Cycle," the recording's final and perhaps most exciting track, Grissett's catchy single-note lines serve as a wind-up for a rising and falling improvisation. Halfway through, after the band pauses, Grissett kicks off the final movement with chiming two-chord motifs, returning at the end to his opening lines.

Two contrasting "Interlude" tracks clock under three minutes. Both leave a listener wishing they were longer. The trio's treatment of the two standards is charming, and gives the iconic melodies lots of breathing room.

Archer and Stewart do much to make Travelogue special. They are not often called upon or inspired to keep conventional time, and they use their freedom to liven every track. Archer offers frequent and clever countermelody commentary on Grissett's themes and variations. Stewart, in his characteristically irrepressible way, keeps the up-tempo passages simmering with a steady stream of rhythmic shifts and playful fills, and his brushwork intensifies the slower ones.

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