Recent Lars Danielsson projects (Tarantella, Pasodoble) have featured the fine Polish pianist Leszek Mozdzer. On this new recording, however, the piano seat is fi lled instead by Tigran Hamasyan, one of the breakthrough artists of 2011. Not that last year’s lovely, twinkling, Armenian folk melody-filled A Fable was Tigran’s first release, or that the award of a series of prestigious prizes hadn’t already announced the birth of a new star to jazz insiders. Anyway, twentysomething Tigran is one to listen out for, as his performance here confi rms: he contributes two compositions, half of a third and an arrangement. The Swedish bassist’s other collaborators aren’t bad either, with the lyrical master Arve Henriksen on trumpet, John Parricelli on guitar, and Magnus Öström on drums. There’s a hint of the latter’s former group, EST, on ‘Party on the Planet’, which has Danielsson on Wurlitzer and Parricelli on fi ne funky form, while ‘Hov arek sarer djan’ sees Tigran dipping into his beloved Armenian folk songbook and contributing characterfully doleful vocals. But, with its cunning variations of mood, from ethereally trancey (‘Yerevan’) to more sombre explorations (‘Tystnaden’), and detailed performances, this remains very much Danielsson’s disc.