Kit Downes joins forces with long-time collaborators Petter Eldh on bass and James Maddren on drums for a carefully assorted piano trio programme that treads gentle lyricism and bold creative outbursts in equal measures. Downes, whose prior ECM offering Dreamlife of Debris was termed a “work of otherworldly beauty” by BBC Music Magazine, carves out some of his most compendious pieces to date on Vermillion. Replete with subtle twists and turns, the trio offers its idiosyncratic take on the piano trio format, producing unexpected harmonic alterations and animate rhythmic flashes as they flesh out distinct musical forms. Recorded at the Auditorio Stelio Molo in Lugano, the three-piece outlines a unique design for this instrumentation in clear-cut interplay and creates a profound study of Kit Downes’ broad musical imagination in the process.

In the past his group with drummer James Maddren and bassist Petter Eldh released music as Enemy, but here the group is rebranded — perhaps to widen Downes’ portfolio — while pivoting from its old fusion-oriented sound for something more hushed. Still, it remains the work of a collective, as the bassist wrote as many of the tunes as the nominal leader, including the ravishing highlight, ‘Class Fails’. It’s a delicate recording where the tactile cymbal play of Maddren is heightened and the percussive snap of Eldh is muted, so in some ways the name change makes sense. There’s an emphasis on balladry, with each part of the triumvirate pulling out subtle melodic threads from the written themes like a magician, only for them to seemingly vanish as quickly as they appeared.
Peter Margasak, The Quietus