Avishai Cohen - Ashes to Gold (ECM)

Trumpeter and composer Avishai Cohen continues his winning streak with Ashes to Gold. The Israeli musician’s thirteenth album – and sixth for ECM – was written, rehearsed, and recorded in the wake of Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, something that deeply affected the work.

A multi-part suite, “Ashes to Gold” feels more painterly than previous Cohen albums. Relying less on improvisation than on focused group interplay, the band – Cohen on trumpet, flugelhorn, and flute, Yonathan Avishai on piano, Barak Mori on bass, Ziv Ravitz on drums – pours a rollercoaster of emotions into the suite: rage, terror, disappointment, melancholy, a deep desire for peace. Unfolding with the careful precision of a classical symphony, “Ashes to Gold” swoons with the delicate beauty Cohen brings to most of his work, but also throbs with the conflicting feelings brought on by war. Quietly stunning in that distinctive Cohen manner, It may well be the leader’s masterpiece.

As a relief from the brooding power of the suite, Cohen adds a pair of tracks he did not himself compose. The stately, elegiac “Adagio assai” comes from Maurice Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G major. But the bigger surprise is “The Seventh,” an exquisitely melodic tune written by Cohen’s teenage daughter Amalia. It’s an enchanting ending to what’s otherwise a fairly heavy record, and makes Ashes to Gold even better.