Search - Rita Marcotulli :: Woman Next Door

Another Undiscovered Gem

R. Wyatt | London | 02/25/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"A wonderful disk covering a wide range of musical styles but somehow distinctly European. Brilliant use of instrumentation, especially the woodwind and some very fine piano playing. Thoroughly recommended to anybody looking for something refreshingly different from the current crop of predictable US mainstream jazz releases. Deserves to be a big seller but destined to become just another unappreciated gem."

What can't she do?

Jan P. Dennis | Monument, CO USA | 01/15/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Conceptualize, compose, arrange, lead, play--she does it all. You NEED to hear Rita Marcotulli, among the most brilliant jazz practioners alive.I thought her 2003 disc Koine was one of the very best of the year, and this is every bit its equal.Inspired by the filmaking of Francois Truffaut and actually employing small bits of themes from his films, this transcendent music not only provides a fascinating aural commentary on the great French director's film oevre, it also stands by itself as a completely remarkable document of the state of late twentieth century European jazz.If you're not familiar with what's been happening on the European jazz scene lately, this is as good a place as any to start. One thing you'll immediately notice: it's wild eclecticism held together by by a unique blending of folk, classical, blues, caberet, world, and jazz elements--all filtered through a sensibility that both draws and departs from American jazz sources. By turns ravishingly lyrical ("Que Reste-T-Il," "Les 400 Coups"), mesmeric ("Antoine Doinel"), bossa-inspired ("Les Enfants S'ennuient le Dimanche"), playful ("Musique en Jeu"), elegiac ("Missa di Memoria," which sounds as if it could be from The Mission soundtrack), world-jazzy ("Escape"), mysterious ("Fragment (of the Third Kind)," Songs of Innocence," and "Songs of Experience"), Monkish ("The Japanese Mistress"), and jauntily European ("Arpeggio e Fuga"), this music breathtakingly showcases Marcotulli's prodigious talents.Incredibly, it all hangs together, naturally, inevitably.I'm just blown away by this amazing woman. And I think you will be to. Beg, borrow, steal--whatever. JUST GET THIS RECORD (and Koine, while you're at it)."