Label: FWF Records, 2025

Personnel - Leandros Pasias: piano; Vangelis Vrachnos: double bass; Giorgos Klountzos Chrysidis: drums + Harris Lambrakis: ney; James Wylie: saxophone.

Yako Trio’s eclectic instincts are fully on display on their latest album, Woven, an even-keeled exploration of genre-bending ambiences filtered through the group’s distinctive lens. The Thessaloniki-based trio—pianist Leandros Pasias, bassist Vangelis Vrachnos, and drummer Giorgos Klountzos Chrysidis—expands into a quintet here with two guest woodwind players: New Zealander saxophonist James Wylie and Athens-born flutist Harris Lambrakis.

This highly listenable session opens with “Mr. McCoy”, a tribute to pianist McCoy Tyner and the invigorating energy of his playing. Written by Pasias, the piece centers around a rich harmonic riff while Coltranean lines surge from the frontline. Swinging underneath with liberating force, it features ecstatic improvisations from each member and vividly evokes Tyner’s ‘70s post-bop. Vrachnos’ “Ghostly Wind” follows, unfolding like an Eastern dance with groovy bass figures, catchy melodicism, and a gently lilting rhythmic flow.

Pasias reveals an interesting, broad compositional vision throughout, contributing some of the album’s most gripping pieces, including “Kloutzoa” and “Impromptu”. The former—a breezy, soulful tune written for Chrysidis and recalling Kamasi Washington’s soul-jazz pulse—rides on a nicely chilled beat from the drummer; while the latter feels as if McCoy Tyner had teamed up with Mulatu Astatke in a modal post-bop/world-fusion crossroad, with flute-and-sax juxtapositions reaching a spiritual sensitivity. Pasias also composed “Myrtilo”, a soothing, luminous ballad.

Chrysidis’ “Speaking Voice” begins with cymbal magnification before settling into a seductive, R&B-inflected piece that nods to fusion through bouncing electric piano textures and skittering hi-hat patterns. The album winds down in a relaxed atmosphere with Vrachnos’ ballad “Sweet Lotus”.

Woven, named for its interlacing of musical idioms, showcases Yako Trio’s global sensibilities and captures the ear through the clarity and cohesion of their musical craft.

Favorite Tracks:
01 - Mr. McCoy ► 03 - Kloutzoa ► 04 - Impromptu

Label: Fair Weather Friends Records, 2022

Personnel - Leandros Pasias: piano; Vangelis Vrachnos: double bass; George Klountzos Chrysidis: drums + Guests: James Wylie: alto saxophone (#1,3,5,6); Nicolas Masson: tenor and soprano saxophone (#2,4).

Paying homage to the sea, the Yako Trio shows considerable musical malleability on their sophomore album OdesSea. The follow up to their self-released debut Ode to Yannis (2018), which paid tribute to the late Greek composer Yannis Konstantinidis, is made of six diversified tunes that, influenced by jazz and classical idioms, evokes the mercurial temperament of the trio formed in Thessaloniki, Greece, by pianist Leandros Pasias, bassist Vangelis Vrachnos, and drummer George Klountzos Chrysidis.

Heavily invested in an upbeat post-bop and delivered in a winged 3/4 tempo, “The Call” opens the album with modal brilliance, showing that Pasias’ writing is not pedestrian. Guesting on this one to steal the show is the New Zealander saxophonist James Wylie, a member of Anna Webber’s septet Percussive Mechanics. His outside incursions and zigzagging maneuvers find a continuous harmonic track in the fluidity of the piano playing. An unaccompanied bass statement winds up with a pedal point, transitioning to an ecstatic finale where the saxophonist flanks his spiked-punch phrases with long, stunningly timbral one-note blows.

The title track is percussively stable, cooked with restraint despite the dynamic soprano solo by Swiss saxist Nicolas Masson, who switches to tenor on the Vrachnos-penned “Sand”, a ballad with emotional heft. Navigating a completely different wavelength, “Afromacedonian Dance”, another piece by the bassist, explores non-Western sounds with the gravitational pull of a 15-beat bass groove that defines its smooth dancing quality. Wylie dialogues with Pasias, before Vrachnos and Chrysidis enhance their parts.

With less individualism and more collectivism, “Indian Dream” calmly develops in seven, spreading a gentle breeze that involves us earnestly. However, Wylie steps forward, cascading lyrically over the swelling texture of the song’s last segment. The album closes with Pasias’ “Lullaby”, a fragile song driven by subtle brushwork and economic, if well-measured, bass plucks.

This is a very satisfying set by a trio that pushes itself to fertile territories with firm-footing consistency and modern taste.