Rob Adams Journalist

Following a successful run of four sextet recordings, Cork-born, Hertfordshire-based pianist John Donegan changes direction with a return to the jazz piano trio tradition on his latest album, Interfuse.

“I loved working with the sextet – I still do – but I wanted to shake things up a bit and revisit the trio format,” says Donegan whose piano influences include Bill Evans, Wynton Kelly, Hampton Hawes, Bud Powell, Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, and Kenny Barron.

The trio recordings of Bill Evans are particular favourites of Donegan’s and they inspired him to explore the tradition again. He had also been struck by saxophonist Richie Buckley’s lyrical side and improvising strengths while leading the Irish Sextet that has made three enthusiastically received albums. So the trio becomes a quartet on tracks including the energetic opener, Blues Jive, which also pays homage to Thelonious Monk with its edgy attack.

Blues Jive is one of two new compositions – the other being the heartfelt ballad A Resolute Rose dedicated to Donegan’s young grand-daughter – on the album. A prolific composer, Donegan also likes to reinterpret previous work, finding new meaning and new inspiration when taking a different approach.

The album’s title track, Interfuse, which originally appeared on the sextet album A Kite for Kate, returns as a quartet piece here and the idiosyncratic Funny Isn’t It, which Donegan first recorded as a solo piano piece, is updated in the trio format.

Donegan is joined in the trio by two longstanding colleagues. Drummer John Daly has provided the swing, drive and detail on Donegan’s three Irish Sextet albums and bassist Bernard O’Neill, who has acted as producer on eight of Donegan’s nine previous albums, takes up a dual role as producer and Daly’s rhythm section partner.

Alongside the trio and quartet tracks there is a solo piano performance of A Song for Ciara, a tender dedication to Donegan’s eldest daughter which first appeared on the pianist’s 1997 album of the same name.

A musician of huge experience – he has played with jazz luminaries Art Blakey, Art Farmer, Barney Kessel and Greg Abate as well as the world class Irish guitarist Louis Stewart – Donegan is constantly driven by the desire to explore music, both his own and other musicians’.

“I love to listen almost as much as I love to play,” he says. “Above all, though, what I want to do is keep my own music interesting, for me and for the listener. I feel we’ve done that with these nine tracks and I couldn’t have asked for better recording partners than John, Bernard and Richie.”

Interfuse was recorded at Camden Studios, Dublin on 28^th and 29^th May 2025 and 28^th August 2025. It's released on Jayde Records.

Wellington-based Scottish drummer John Rae and New Zealand-born pianist Ben Wilcock follow their internationally acclaimed Splendid Isolation album with March of the Octopus, a suite of original compositions ranging from reflective solo piano pieces to quintet explorations, on Friday 28th November.

Recorded in Neil Finn of Crowded House’s Roundhead Studios, the album features Rae and Wilcock with NZ jazz stalwarts, bassist Patrick Bleakley and tenor saxophonist Roger Manins, plus emerging guitarist Theo Thompson.

Long-time collaborators and co-founders of Thick Records NZ, Rae and Wilcock brought their shared vision to life in the studio, reflecting their own ideas while also creating an open canvas for the quintet’s distinctive improvisational voices.

“Our years of performing together have shaped an organic, conversational interplay,” says Wilcock. “It’s music that - for us - feels at once deeply personal and effortlessly collective. It was also great to bring in Theo Thompson, whose fresh sound expands the ensemble’s tonal palette.”

The album comprises nine tracks, utilising eight compositions, with the writing credits split equally between Rae and Wilcock. Rae’s opening What’s in a Name, a solo piano feature for Wilcock, returns later as The Fox, arranged for the quintet. The piece has also featured as a big band arrangement for the inaugural concert by the Aotearoa Jazz Orchestra, the national jazz orchestra of New Zealand of which Rae is the musical director.

Inspiration for the music included family members, including Rae’s wife, Suzy, and a sniffy request from an audience member that Wilcock wittily transformed into a composition with a coded title.

“We really enjoyed the process of putting the music together and then recording at the now legendary Roundhead Studios,” says Wilcock. “We hope that enjoyment passes on to the listener and having premiered this material at Wellington Jazz Festival 2025 we’re looking forward to taking it out to more audiences.”

March of the Octopus was engineered and mixed by De Stevens and mastered in Scotland by Scottish guitarist Kevin Murray. It's released on Thick Records NZ.

The relaunched Livia Records continues to reactivate the great Irish guitarist Louis Stewart's back catalogue with two releases.

Due on 14^th November, Alone Together features Stewart with flute virtuoso Brian Dunning in a set of ten duets from 1979. Alongside familiar tunes including There Will Never Be Another You, Chick Corea's Windows and Joe Henderson's Inner Urge tracks include Definitely Doctored, co-written by Stewart and Dunning and showing their wit and accomplishment.

The second release is the reactivated Tunes, from 2013, which features Stewart with his great friend, pianist Jim Doherty, who discovered a teenage Stewart in 1960 and set him on course to become Ireland's first world class jazz musician. They recorded Doherty's Spondance in 1986, which Livia reissued earlier this year, and by 2013 they were so comfortable in each other's company that Tunes might be considered a series of intimate conversations based on some of their favourite standards.