Hypnotic, magnetic new album by Anouar Brahem which adds a new dimension to our knowledge of this exceptional Tunisian musician. "Le pas du chat noir" gives the clearest indication yet of the work of Brahem as a composer and features a spacious "chamber music" that resonates with the freshness of improvisation. The instrumentation is unique: oud, piano, accordion. Brahem's writing for this combination is highly evocative, meticulously controlled and sparse. Half of the magic, as he notes, resides in the not-played, in the marvelous mingling of overtones, sounds that rise from the piano to blend with the warm tones of the oud and the breath of the accordion's bellows.
Featured Artists
Anouar Brahem
Oud
Francois Couturier
Piano
Jean-Louis Matinier
Accordion
Recorded
July 2001, Radio Studio DRS, Zürich
Original Release Date
09.09.2002
TRACKS
1 The Footsteps of the Black Cat
(Anouar Brahem)
07:51
2 With all your heart
(Anouar Brahem)
07:38
3 Leila in the land of the carousel
(Anouar Brahem)
06:33
4 Picnic in Nagpur
(Anouar Brahem)
04:11
5 It's somewhere else
(Anouar Brahem)
08:02
6 You who know
(Anouar Brahem)
05:56
7 The tree that sees
(Anouar Brahem)
06:07
8 A blue dot
(Anouar Brahem)
01:44
9 The Wings of Bourak
(Anouar Brahem)
04:52
10 Rue du départ
(Anouar Brahem)
06:00
11 Leila au pays du carrousel, var.
(Anouar Brahem)
05:36
12 It's already night
(Anouar Brahem)
05:10
MEDIA REACTIONS
A record of astonishing harmonic richness, Le pas du chat noir attests to Brahem's unexpected devotion to the piano as a compositional tool and forces some retrospective recognition of how classically pianistic a lot of his music has been down the years. The oud here takes its place in a rich and constantly shifting context, with the two keyed instruments creating contrasting textures and environments for Brahem's gorgeous melody lines. ... This is a consistently rewarding and very surprising record. Ask me a year from now and I'll be finding new things in it.
Brian Morton, Jazzreview
The album is at once an extension and an audacious departure from the tradition of the oud. Despite his formidable knowledge of the maqarnat, an ornate system of modes that anchors Arabic music, he rarely bases his improvisations directly on the maqams. His phrasing is pure and uncluttered, expressing itself through silence almost as often as sound. ...Composed of elegantly flowing lines and somber, breathlike silences, the music shimmers with the overtones of the piano. ... Mr. Brahem bases several of the tunes on spare, broken chords, repeated in the childlike manner of Satie. Simple though they are, however, they contain beguiling Arabesques. The three musicians rarely appear at once, performing as a trio on only seven of the album's 12 tracks. For the most part, you hear duets - piano and oud, oud and accordion, accordion and oud. The musicians often double each other's lines, but rarely in unison, which enhances the music's intimacy while producing a floating, echo effect. If every band projects "an image of community," as the critic Greil Marcus once suggested, then Mr. Brahem's trio - part takht, part jazz trio, part chamber ensemble - evokes a kind of 21st century Andalusia, in which European and Arab sensibilities have merged so profoundly that the borders between them have dissolved. The image may be utopian, but its beauty is undeniable.
Adam Shatz, The New York Times
The album is like a sad rhapsody, full of shadowy mirages and blue echoes, the prevailing melancholy not dour and heavy but rather light and cloudy. Names like Satie, Debussy, Mounir Bachir, even Eno in acoustic mode keep flashing across your mental screen as you listen. This is academy music with no clothes on, naked and awkward, honest and beautiful. Close your eyes and you could be in the port of Dar el Baida, a seagull swooping over a grey-blue sea and huge cranes and rusty hulled freighters in the background, the light and forgetful breeze brushing your cheek. Le pas du chat noir features uncontrived performances of cat-like agility - soft, bright-eyed and magical. It is a brilliant piece of work.
Andy Morgan, Songlines
Who would have thought that the supremely subtle oud could be featured on a recording with piano, that most dominantly Western of instruments' Meticulously arranged and ideally, gorgeously recorded, Le pas du chat noir features Tunisian oud virtuoso/composer Anouar Brahem in a fresh setting conceived at the keyboard and then realized with pianist François Couturier and accordionist Jean-Louis Matinier. The result is as redolent of the French minimalism of Satie and, even more so, his Catalan successor Mompou as it is of traditional Arabic music. There is a hushed, highly concentrated quality to this Pan-Mediterranean musical "haiku", with the notes purified down to their absolute essence. The entire package - music, sound, cover design - is ECM at its best. As much as any of the label's "crossover" hits, this album brims with appeal for all who have an ear for the best in music.
Bradley Bambarger, Billboard
Arabische, Maghrebinische oder gar Weltmusik - derlei Schubladen waren für den Tunisiaschen Oudvirtuosen Anouar Brahem von jeher zu eng. Bestes Beispiel: das Trioalbum Thimar mit John Surman und Dave Holland. Jetzt hat er mit dem französische Pianisten François Couturier und dem Akkordeonspieler Jean-Louis Matinier ein noch weitaus ubytauscher instrumentiertes Trio zusammengestellt. Die Stücke entwickelte er am Klavier. Erst viel später found sein eigentliches Instrument, die arabische Laute Oud, ihren Platz in dieser sparsamen Kammermusik voller Stille, Poesie und atmosphärischer Nähe zu Erik Satie, in der das Akkordeon gleichsam die Rolle einer "inneren Stimme" aufbarer. Chains.
Berthold Klostermann, Background Forum
Diese stille, touching music lebt von wechselden Dialogen, which bring Arabische Gelassenheit in rhythmischer Vertracktheit mit europäischer Kammermusik von Bach bis zur Klassischen Moderne in Einklang. Jean-Louis Matinier zieht die Klänge seines Akkordeons mit einer bittersüßen, vibrierenden Eleganz; Klänge, die in ihrer redüzten Intensität wie ferne Schwingungen des innersten Wesens französische Muzettes wirken. Dazwischen weben sich die Töne der Oud, die zart von François Couturier am Flügel aufgegriffen und mit sutiler Raffinesse verdoppelt werden. Intime Zwiegspräche entwickln sich, eine einsam schwingende Klaviersaite ruft ein Echo auf der Oud hervor, es entshtät ein Frage-und-Antwort-Spiel von geradezu hypnotischer Kraft.
Sven Thielmann, Stereoplay
Dramatiques, sereines, légères, profondes... Il est difficile de qualify les atmosphères qui s'en dégégent. En un mot, voilà une musique pleine, qui n'a pas peur du vide, du quasi-silence, où la note juste est conservée, sans excès de minimalisme étriqué. ... Sans jamais perdre la direction qu'il s'est choisie, ce disque réaffirme le plaisir et sa sensualité de ce musician expert, son goût pour la formule du trio, format qu'il creuse en renouvelant constantement l'instrumentation.
Jaques Denis, Jazzman (Choc Jazzman)
CONCERTS
YEAR DATE VENUE LOCATION
2025 April 18 Le Rocher de Palmer Cenon, France
2025 April 23 Philharmonie Berlin, Germany
2025 April 24 Tivoli Vredenburg Utrecht, Netherlands
2025 April 25 ECM Explorations- Philharmonie Paris, France
2025 April 26 ECM Explorations- Philharmonie Paris, France
2025 April 27 off Beat Festival Basel, Switzerland
2025 April 29 Auditorium Maurice-Ravel de Lyon Lyon, France
2025 April 30 Bozar Bruxelles, Belgium
2025 May 01 Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Germany
2025 May 02 Isarphilharmonie Munich, Germany
2025 May 03 de Roma Antwerp, Belgium
2025 November 02 National Concert Hall Dublin, Ireland
2025 November 08 EnjoyJazz Festival-Christuskirche Mannheim, Germany
