New Moon

This is a very smooth bit of music-making from Carnatic violinist Arun Ramamurthy, accompanied by Damon Banks on bass and Sameer Gupta on drums. Based in Brooklyn, NY, Ramamurthy has made a name for himself, not only as an expert exponent of South Indian music, but also for exploring the music of his hometown, especially jazz. The album is billed as a fusion between the two traditions and in many ways this pays off, though the jazz elements tend to come from the solid Banks and Gupta, over which the violin lines stick to a far more Carnatic-inspired soundworld. And even if this is not as much a fusion as a juxtaposition, there is less of a mismatch than might be imagined, in large part because each musician is so thoroughly in control of their instrument. Most of the album is dedicated to the four-movement ‘New Moon Suite’ (tracks two to five, including the funky ‘Bangalore to Brooklyn’, a heavily Carnatic homage to Ramamurthy’s grandmother, ‘Aaji’, and the more experimental ‘Amāvasyā’), a CMA New Jazz Works commission. However, the track which I felt came closest to combining the two traditions was, fittingly, ‘Walk as One’.