Label: Next Level, 2021
Personnel - Yoonmi Choi: piano; Myles Sloniker: bass; Samvel Sarkisyan: drums.
New York-based South Korean pianist, composer and musical director Yoonmi Choi makes a powerful debut with 7 Days, an album inspired by Michelangelo’s High Renaissance paintings of the Sistine Chapel. Assisted by the American bassist Myles Sloniker and the Dutch drummer Samvel Sarkisyan, she shapes her malleable, genre-bending piano playing in discerning ways, narrating the seven days of creation with an agile touch and movement coherence. Each composition adds new elements to the previous, opening slide doors to other realms where reflections of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff as well as Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett are detected.
Choi’s classical resources are fully on display on “1st Day”, where the flowing piano streams project sophistication. The stately chordal work here creates both emotion and tension, enjoying the proper accompaniment from the rhythmic foundation. Possessing a more outgoing essence, Sarkisyan is particularly in evidence here, but also on “2nd Day”, a rhythmically defiant piece in 7/8 that feels simultaneously bold and graceful. Among the knotty accents, you’ll find jazz and pop forms blending together, with hints of funk at the base.
Accessing swells of virtuosic lines, “3rd Day” is a Chick Corea-oriented odyssey with a grooving posture and a perfect integration of rhythmic and melodic passages. It shares some progressive elements with the bouncy “5th Day”, where the post-bop meets occasional Latin groove. Also showing the pianist’s dexterous technique and expression, “4th Day” is a rhapsodic classical waltz with cinematic aptitude and inventive changes in pace, rhythm and texture.
The trio’s crossover appeal is transported to the polyrhythmic “6th Day”, whose arrangement joins the energy of rock, the sumptuousness of jazz and the lightness of classical. The album ends graciously with the solo pianism of “7th Day”.
By not overstuffing her brightly-colored musical canvas, Choi creates ample space to breathe and harmonious development, and the emotions arise naturally. She’s a creative pianist; one to keep an eye on.
Grade B
Favorite Tracks:
03 - 3rd Day ► 04 - 4th Day ► 05 - 5th Day