Achim Kaufmann, Later

Pianist Achim Kaufmann may not be on your radar presently but he probably should be. I've been listening to his solo album Later (Pirouet 3084), which came out towards the end of last year. He is a German jazz artist of note, a modern stylist on the sophisticated-edgy yet strongly rooted side of things, with a definite harmonically advanced sense and melodic originality. You hear bop and after foundations, Lennie Tristano through to the present, but with his own twist on it all.

I covered his trio outing Grunen: Pith and Twig this past February 24, 2015 on these pages and liked it a good deal. 

He plays a most unusual concatenation of pieces on this new one, originals, yes, plus Duke, Nichols, Monk, Michael Moore, Hans Eisler, Syd Barrett and Bob Dylan! He makes all of the music his own by the sheer force of his approach.

Listen to Nichols' "Shuffle Montgomery" for what that means. A beautiful number to begin with, but then extended brilliantly to Kaufmann-land.

What that is must be heard. The album is sheer pleasure such that anyone with a love of imaginative ultra-modern jazz piano will be quite pleased with it, I suspect. Achim is a player to hear, to "watch," and to appreciate. This album is pretty near stunning. Listen to it!!