Live! In Harmony
Samuel Bonnet Trio
Divertissement Mercier (samuelbonnetguitar.bandcamp.com/album/live-in-harmony)
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Samuel Bonnet is a jazz guitarist currently living in Montreal. Born in Israel, he studied classical and jazz guitar in France, graduating in musicology at the University of Paris. In 2009 he moved to Montreal to study classical guitar. Bonnet’s unique jazz sound relies on using a nylon stringed classical guitar amplified to produce a rich and nuanced sound. Jazz has a history of including classical guitar: for example in the bossa nova tunes of Carlos Jobim and the legendary New York guitarist Gene Bertoncini who, decades ago, studied classical guitar to reinvent his jazz playing.
Live! In Harmony is Bonnet’s second trio recording and the performances are from the Jazz Room (Waterloo, ON) and Rucher de Bolton (Quebec). This album shows jazz at its essential elements: a clean amplified acoustic guitar, upright bass (Jonathan-Guillaume Boudreau) and drums (Simon Bergeron) playing unique arrangements of eight standards. All the arrangements are thoughtful and original. For example, the Nardis cover is quite beautiful beginning with a swishing drum intro which introduces the delicate guitar melody, where Bonnet throws in a few harmonics, and includes a contrapuntal interplay with the bass. The audience’s applause on all tracks adds to a sense of immediacy. The trio’s performances of these and other tunes can also be found on Bonnet’s YouTube Channel.
