Nick Russoniello + The Golden Age Quartet | The Golden Age Project

Nick Russoniello – saxophones

Rachael Beesley and Julia Russoniello – violins

Stephan Duwe – viola

Teije Hyklema – cello

Ella Brinch – viola

Paul Stender – cello

Da Vinci Classics record label – Available here

Known for his virtuosic performances as both a soloist and as an ensemble player Nick Russoniello goes one step further than mere performer to be a protagonist for music of a long gone time and also an accomplished arranger of music of that time and a writer that references that period – the glorious heyday of jazz inspired musical madness of the 1920’s and thereabouts.

In the company of George Gershwin it is Russoniello’s own Razorhurst that intrigues the most. Atmospheric and rhythmically interesting from the outset this movement shows the composer to be completely at ease with writing music that references music of the 1920’s and still sound fresh. It is fun and its increasing density and layers make it enjoyable after multiple hearings.  A solo for sax, Valse Rudy, again by Russoniello is a most appropriate completion of the CD – a farewell to the time gone by. Wistful and full of longing it is music that seems to jumps the decades.

Gershwin’s Three Preludes are a distillation of the Golden Age and in Russoniello’s lovely arrangements transports the listener to a world full of gaiety, dance madness and much more. The bouncy first movement gives way to languid music only for the listener to be jolted back into syncopated dance rhythms in the third movement.

Erwin Schullhof is a composer that deserves much more airplay and concert performances. His Esquisses de jazz (1927) originally for piano sound even better as a sax and string work as the sustain and varying tone colours afforded by non-percussion instruments make the music even more haunting.

For me this is a CD more about the performers than the musical content itself as Russoniello shows himself to be a master not only of his instruments but of the genre he has immersed himself in and the string players all deserve to be commended for appropriately sensitive and at times perfectly sentimental playing.

For people who love the music and films and the whole excitement of the 1920’s this is a CD that will give great joy.