Baptiste Trotignont is one of France’s greatest jazz pianists – which will come as no surprise to anyone. What is perhaps rather less well known is that this Parisian started out playing the violin, although the influence of his amateur pianist father was crucial in his finally deciding to take up the instrument for which he is now known. He studied the classical and particularly the German romantic repertoire and graduated in piano and composition from the Academy of Music in Nantes.

In the mid-1990s, shortly after moving to Paris, Baptiste became a much sought-after figure in the city’s live jazz music venues. Performers such as Eric Le Lann, Aldo Romano and David Murray often asked him to play with them in the clubs of the French capital. The first academic recognition of his good work was soon to follow, when he won second prize as a soloist in the “Concours National de Jazz de la Défense” From then on, official celebrations began to become a regular occurrence for Baptiste Trotignont and, in 2001, when he released his first album, Fluide, he was awarded the prestigious “Django d’Or” prize for the most promising French musician.

In this concert, brought to you by JAZZMADRID, you will be able to enjoy this artist in one of the most creative periods of his life. Five years ago, the French Institute invited him to perform with Minino Garay, a Gaucho percussionist who specialises in the Argentinian tambor legüero and the Peruvian cajón, but Trotignont is visiting us in the format that suits him best: solo piano. And this despite the fact that the author of these lines has a splendid memory of an album by Bill Mobley’s Space Time Big Band, on which it was clear that Baptiste was already a very solid performer.

The artist’s latest album, released this year, revisits British pop standards by artists and groups ranging from The Beatles to Radiohead. It is therefore more than likely that this will be the repertoire we will hear at the concert. And we’ll also be able to confirm that Baptiste Trotignont has a truly independent left piano hand, one of those that always drives its own content without ever forgetting the tempo, while the right hand tirelessly searches for the narrative, discovering highly fecund melodies with which he often leaves us reeling. The musician even announces many of these melodies during the course of his performance.

And one last thing! Baptiste Trotignont – in the same way perhaps that Joe Henderson managed to break free from the magnetic influence of Coltrane in his time – doesn’t just try to reproduce the discoveries of the great piano icons of our time; think, if you wish, of Brad Mehldau, or, if we confine ourselves to the strictly European and, more precisely, French sphere, of Jean Michel Pilc. Trotignont has originality. His inventions ooze aesthetics, style, ideas and, of course, achievements. Hand-to-hand combat with the piano.