Ari Hoenig | Tea for Three review

At a glance

Drummer Ari Hoenig even sings on ‘For Tracy’ dedicated to his wife Tracy Appleton here with pianist Gadi Lehavi and bassist Ben Tiberio on a studio album recorded in Brooklyn last year. ”This is the first time I’ve recorded two consecutive records with the same personnel,” says Hoenig.

The dynamic 51-year-old Philadelphian must mean Golden Treasures – and that release even factored in a little added guitar.

But sandwich between that and this new ‘un there was also the worth seeking out Enchanted involving two UK scene players and regular fixtures on marlbank in recent years, the erstwhile punk jazzer in his WorldService Project days the owl-ish Conor Chaplin and Tom Ollendorff who as part of the Fab 4 can be heard at the Vortex in early-2025 in the band of the pianist-singer Fabienne Ambuehl.

Hoenig’s records under his own name don’t often get reviewed in these pages ONLY because there are only so many hours in the day but the American drummer is on loads of records as a sideman we really like including above all Shahin Novrasli’s wonderful 2022 release, Bayati.

Ravi Coltrane pianist Gadi Lehavi excels

Pianist Gadi Lehavi is excellent setting the scene well on both opening tracks.

We managed to hear the Tel Aviv born player live in Ravi Coltrane’s band that played London’s Barbican in October 2022 and recall that storming gig well. Here in this video the pianist is in action in the States with Coltrane.

Hoenig’s tune ‘Nominor’ is one of the best of the tom rattler’s tunes.

Lehavi is meaningfully tender on another fine composition, the ballad ‘Alone’ which is certainly yet another strong suit of Tea for Three issued under the livery of the Barcelona jazz indie Fresh Sound New Talent.

The pianist inevitably given how ubiquitous an influence Brad Mehldau is, yup – fancy that – Mehldau-like at the beginning of the treatment of ‘You Stepped out of a Dream’ the standard that derives from the MGM musical Ziegfeld Girl and sung by crooner Tony Martin in the 40s.

Martin would much later in his career play a disastrous gig – interestingly recounted in the Uncle Paul’s Jazz Closet podcast – with Paul Motian, not an obvious drummer for a cheesy crooner AT ALL.

The same Tea for Three trio as featured on the new release above captured on YouTube during Covid era mask wearing 2021 times.

Motian-like cool

Hoenig is sometimes a Motian-like drummer on some tracks so that’s a neat and apt link perhaps on some passages. He also makes me think of the sound of the Northern Irish drummer David Lyttle a tad.

We’ll give Hoenig’s own crooning a wide berth. But beyond excusable indulgence everything else here is absolutely fine and dandy.

Overall it’s a more than decent album that showcases the pianist as much as the drummer. Of course the bassist ain’t too shabby either but really it’s Lehavi’s sound that wins the day geed up by the ever game Hoenig who rouses the trio time and again.

An all-round win

I don’t even like the Vincent Youmans 1920s melody ‘Tea for Two’ but the treatment here may even make me for one revise my opinion of that ever grating melody somehow recalibrated to factor out a surfeit of cheese. There’s too much here to go into but suffice to say three proves as ever a magic number. The piano trio format YET AGAIN proves it is the premier small group vehicle in contemporary jazz that keeps reviving itself on albums such as this unassuming but cherishable release.

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