Last November Nikol Bóková returned to London as part of the combined London Jazz Festival 2024 and 28th Made in Prague Festival. This Trio has the same line-up as the Quartet, bar electric guitarist David Dorůžka, with whom she performed. Recorded at Czech Radio’s Recording Studio 1 in Prague by her (new) husband Jan Bók Vala, Feathers is the Czech jazz pianist-composer’s eighth album. She tempted with tasters at the Crazy Coqs.

The first eight tracks are titled ‘Feather Nº 1’ to ‘Feather Nº 8’. For the final – and shortest at 1:47 – track, ‘Afterfeather’, Kocián switches to bow while their Polish drummer, Wierzgoń adds the subtlest of percussion touches. In concert the rolling ‘Feather Nº 3’ immediately hooked me. A stand-out, it keeps getting better and revealing more.

Nikol Bóková is the first jazz pianist to excite me the way Zoe Rahman did. What caught my ear about Rahman was her music’s distinctive cultural blend in a jazz idiom. Nikol Bóková has a distinctive Central European sound palette blend of her own. She draws on Czech, Slovak and Polish music. Chopin is an example of the last on Feathers. Sheer brilliance. Available from www.soleiletpluie.com