This is the story of a friendship, or rather, a successful grafting, between two exquisite talents of French jazz. What brings them together: from piano to double bass, an ethereal touch—and this quest for balance between technical virtuosity and hyper-sensitive playing, not to mention a mischievous delight in hybridizing contemporary jazz, passionately breaking down barriers, drawing as much from classical heritage as from pop culture. A repertoire takes shape: from gospel to folk, from Paris to Ireland, from Lebanon to Cuba, from Aretha Franklin to Nick Drake or Sting and even London Grammar, via Fauré and Schumann, it gathers that songbook we adore without knowing it, those intimate hits that share a "universal canvas" according to Stéphane Kerecki, "thereby offering a vast horizon for improvisation." "We wanted to savor the space between the notes," says Thomas Enhco. "To play with silence."
But the pandemic suddenly suspended time… and prevented the musicians from making music together. Listening to recordings of their sessions remotely, Stéphane and Thomas perceived a similar magic. And they promised each other that when the world reopened, they would play together again as soon as possible. Thus, when TSF Jazz offered Thomas a live concert to celebrate the end of lockdown, the program was a given. "Right away," the pianist recalls, "we felt a special reception." Because the magic persists in front of an audience: between the crystalline keyboard and the earthy roughness of the strings, the chemistry works. Transcended by the inventiveness of the dialogue, these celestial melodies captivate: "Everyone, at that moment, felt a similar need for space, calm, freedom."
After months of lockdown, an inexpressible emotion overtakes the artists returning to the stage. The album *A Modern Songbook* is imbued with this enchantment. "This music did us good," Stéphane confides.
It also does a lot of good—an immense amount of good—to listen to it.
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