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Amaury Faivre—2020—Independent

Amaury Faivre is a French acoustic blues artist who chose to
celebrate a 20 year career during which he played on more than
800 stages in a dozen countries and on 3 different continents, by
making this album. It is a wonderful self-accolade.

Born in Besançon (France), at the age of 8 he started playing his
father’s harmonica. He became hooked on the harp and later the
guitar and began playing the music of the blues pioneers
listening to artists like Robert Johnson, Mississippi Fred
McDowell and John Lee Hooker.

Some of the harp work here is stunning. None more so than the opener ‘Amuse Bouche’ (translated
as “it amuses the mouth”) a nice little pun as this is both the expression used in hauté cuisine to
describe an ‘off menu starter’ and a description of music from the mouth organ.

An accomplished harp man, Amaury is also a fine guitar player and singer. Check out: ‘Wrong Girl’,
a delightful traditional blues with some great guitar playing and harp work on it as well. In contrast
‘Heart of Stone’ is a folk ballad with an excellent finger picked accompaniment and some great
lyrics. After ‘Amuse Bouche’. My favourite track is ‘Mary Mae’, an excellent traditional blues with
with harp work reminiscent of Sonny Boy #2 and that is closely followed by ‘Invité à Danser’
(Invitation to the Dance) with some wonderful flat picked guitar work, lyrics mostly in French and

a distinct zydeco feel with tinges of country music embedded in it. Amaury sings a tad like Mose
Allison.

All in all this is a cracking CD. If you are a lover of outstanding acoustic music this is for you!

Ian K. McKenzie

Tor E. Bekken—In Fonk We Trust—Blue Mood Records/
Grappa

Tor Einar “Dr” Bekken (born 14 May 1964 ) is a Norwegian
blues and jazz musician (piano). Bekken is currently Associate
Professor of Music at ILU-NTNU in Trondheim Norway. His
work is rooted deeply in jazz, blues and folk traditions. Many of
the dozens of recordings he has made feature solo piano work.

Not so here. This one is with the Dr Bekken Trio, Mattis
Kleppen, bass, electric bass; Dag Kittilsen, drums.

I assume that the word ‘fonk’ is Norwegian for ‘funk’ and if it
clearly related to the funk of New Orleans, to which Bekken has
a strong affinity. Recorded at the Lillehammer Mikrobyggeri (Microbrewery), in the Olympic city of

Lillehammer, Norway, before an enthusiastic audience, Dr Bekker and his colleagues start the
proceedings with a Bekken original, ‘St Pete’ a bit of boogie magic with an outstanding bass solo
from Kleppen. That is followed by a medley consisting of ‘Big Chief/Hey Now Baby/Fire It Up’ a
wonderful trip to New Orlins a la Dr John. The sync with the band—who have played together for 30
years—is phenomenal and the exposition comes with another stunning bass solo.