Gaëtan Casteels Ozaín quintet - Jazz Tour Les Lundis d’Hortense

Second opus for double bassist Gaëtan Casteels' quintet. Here he asserts himself even more as a determined leader with well-defined ideas and plenty of energy. Surrounded by a solid team, to whom he gives a great deal of freedom, Casteels offers us jazz that is as energetic as it is inventive.

Like the greats - Mingus, Haden and Holland to name but a few - Gaëtan Casteels likes to push his colleagues to the limit and see their ideas through to the end. In any case, they love it and know that the leader won't let them down. For this second round of the quintet, the double bassist makes his jazz even rougher, more combative and energetic. The blowers are called upon in every part of the game. No rest for them! So they become even more energetic, inventing exchanges that they themselves might never have imagined. The audience is enthusiastic and, far from being trapped, is given the role of the sixth member of the group. The group can then multiply its need for urgency and freedom tenfold. An Ozain concert, in its original configuration, is bound to be thrilling. Get ready, you're going to feel alive again.

‘One of the most pleasing aspects of the album is the wide variety of tracks, which draw on a range of influences, from African rhythms to Indian scales, with a nod to Baroque music, and Bach in particular, on ‘Tempus Fugit’. Skilfully blending written parts with beautiful unisons and unbridled improvisations, the compositions are well-balanced and flow easily, even recalling at times the sound of the Dave Holland Quintet on ‘Extended Play’, which also included trombone and saxophone, but with an extra vibraphone.

This lively, well-arranged music deserves respect for its daring as well as its success, and there's no doubt that it will transport fans of modern jazz who have definitively thrown off their blinkers’. (Pierre Dulieu - Jazzmania)

Ozaín Quartet is a group with an unusual orchestration: trombone-tenor sax-double bass-drums, a sound that lead bassist Gaëtan Casteels wanted to be rougher, rawer and more powerful. It's the use of all the possible palettes of the quartet without a harmonic instrument, making you forget the absence of it. Gaëtan Casteels' compositions serve as a pretext for the four musicians to express themselves with great freedom. The melodies, sometimes played in unison, sometimes in counterpoint, lead to improvisations that are often collective. Ozaín 4tet is all about grooves, ranging from jazz-rock to swing, with a few rhythms in composed bars. Singing melodies in sometimes exotic modes, with more free-jazz overtures or more mysterious, haunting moods.   

The album, The missing one(s), was released on the Mogno Music label on 15 January 2022 at a double concert at the Petit Théâtre Mercelis in Ixelles.

Ozaín is currently preparing his second album. It will be a different record, as it will feature a quintet with guest Laurent Blondiau. 

As part of this tour, the band will also be presenting the music from this second album, in which the double bassist continues to explore the various possibilities of the quartet - or quintet - without a harmonic instrument, taking the concept of the first album one step further. The music is as energetic as ever, in the tradition of the first album.

The music is still energetic, in the same vein as the first album (one of the tracks was actually on the first album), but with some research into the form of some of the tracks, sometimes breaking away from the usual jazz ‘theme - solos - recapitulation of the theme’. Although I'm a fan of the tradition, I like to look for other ways of doing things, to have several possible grids for the solos on the same piece. It then becomes a mini suite, like Natural Born Piciu on the first album. 

Daniel Stokart - tenor saxophone

Nathan Surquin - trombone

Gaëtan Casteels - double bass, compositions

Pierre Hurty - drums

Laurent Blondiau - trumpet 

https://gaetancasteels.com/ 

As part of the Jazz Tour. A collaboration between An Vert and Les Lundis d'Hortense.

https://leslundisdhortense.be