Oficina Itinerante

Jean-Luc Thomas is a Breton flute player who describes himself as ‘musician and traveller’; previous collaborations have brought him together with performers from India, West Africa and Ireland. But for Oficina Itinerante he chose to work and record with a group of impressive musicians in Brazil. The result is an album of very different parts that ranges in style from light-hearted samba to avant-garde and summons up emotions that veer from sheer delight to eye-rolling bewilderment.

It opens with the infectious ‘Sete Santos’, as Thomas' Celtic-tinged flute dances spryly over Latin percussion. Pieces like this and ‘Pifano Carioca’ are filled with a sunny optimism that can brighten the greyest of days. There are also moments of genuine musical interest and adventurous harmonies; the segue from free improvisation to shifting, dissonant chords on ‘Frevo de Meia Lua’ is a masterclass in intelligent arrangement. However, there are other more experimental tracks that descend into puzzling piffle, the extent to which you stay the course with these meanderings will depend on your tolerance threshold for jazz flute clichés.