In his most ambicious project ever, Portuguese pianist Bernardo Sassetti mix in the same record the two sides of his musical career, as jazz improviser and composer for cinema. And that’s why he plays with a double trio, one the typical jazz combo of piano, double bass (Carlos Barretto) and drums (Alexandre Frazão), the other a chamber formation with cello (Ajda Zupancic) and vibraphone (Jean-François Lezé).

Never before Sassetti sounded so “classical” in CD and, at the same time, so cinematic. We close our eyes and we’re able to translate the music to images, in such a way that we don’t miss any visual complement. Three of the pieces included, “Do Silêncio”, “Revelação” and “Naquele Tempo”, are new versions of the songs taken from the original soundtrack for “A Costa dos Murmúrios”, a film directed by Margarida Cardoso. Enlightening also is to know that “Ascent” is an hommage to another director of the new generation of creators from Portugal, José Álvaro Morais.

In this chamber jazz like opus very much connected to the legacy of Bill Evans the compositions are strongly narrative, as if stories are being told. And it’s not a question of verbosity or structuring – Bernardo Sassetti is fascinated with the cinematographic procedure of mounting sequences. Everything flows in a liquid way, but not in a clean, simple linear sequence. It’s like if someone is constantly telling “and”, adding always more to what he’s saying. Like with cinema, this music is in a permanent “and” motion.

Bernardo Sassetti is one of the top jazz pianists in Portugal and “Ascent” solidifies his prestige for good.