Yazz Ahmed – A Paradise in the Hold
Yazz Ahmed’s Bahraini heritage has always been key to her take on jazz: from the start, the London-based trumpeter/flugelhornist has deployed Arabic quarter-tone scales (she has a specially made flugelhorn to play them) and Middle Eastern percussion. But on her fourth album, it’s more pronounced than ever: the tracks are rooted in Bahraini wedding poems and in fijiri, the songs sung by pearl fishers around the Persian Gulf. The results are enthralling: soloing that feels alternately yearning and exuberant, rich and emotive melodies, the sound – big on vibraphone and electric piano – regularly strafed with fizzing electronics. It’s an album to lose yourself in. Alexis Petridis
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