DOWNBEAT (USA)

Belgian pianists Amaury Faye and Igor Gehenot join forces for a series of duets on Amaury Faye X Igor Gehenot (Hypnote Records; 46:21), braiding influences as disparate as chamber jazz, classical, samba, and rock. There's an impressive clarity and concision to the performances, especially on more straightahead jazz material like Gehenot's spry title composition but too often I found myself suprised that the musicians embrace more counterpoint and harmony considering the instrumentation.

Philip Margasak

Le Soir (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

Two mirrored grand pianos. Igor Gehenot and Amaury Faye facing each other for a four-handed piano concert. We have seen and heard them at festivals and in venues. Here they are now, the "Liégeois from Brussels" Igor and the "Toulousain from Paris" Amaury, on an album, soberly baptized Amaury Faye x Igor Gehenot. Two quite romantic temperaments but who never forget the touch of irony necessary not to take themselves too seriously. Three compositions by Igor, two by Amaury and covers by Ruyichi Sakamoto, Police (Message in a bottle), João Bosco and Chico Buarque. So very varied music, from classical to pop via bossa-nova, and which speaks immediately to the heart. And two pianists who intertwine their scrolls rather than opposing them. Because they are not adversaries but accomplices who only want one thing: to offer us the best of their music. The result is tremendous.

Jean-Claude Vantroyen

RTBF - MUSIQ3 (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

No question of a jazz battle but a beautiful encounter between two pianists. One is Belgian, Igor Gehenot, the other French, Amaury Faye. They unite to offer us a magnificent album: Amaury Faye x Igor Gehenot. Meeting with the pianist from Liège, Igor Gehenot to present us this album in duet with Amaury Faye. The album was to be recorded initially in Liège in 2021 but following the floods and the damage in the studio, it was finally in the south of France, in Toulouse (hometown of Amaury Faye) that it was recorded. is saved. It was one of the challenges of the album, how to distribute the roles and make each piece unique. Recorded in Toulouse last October at the Pianos Parisot center, it includes original compositions as well as works by Chico Buarque, Joao Bosco, Sting and Ryuichi Sakamoto with a superb interpretation of Bibo No Aozora, a theme heard in the film Babel d 'Alejandro González Iñárritu. The artistic director of the album is none other than Giuseppe Millaci, bassist and director of the Hypnote Records label.

Arnaud Quitellier

RTBF - CLASSIC21 (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

Pianists Amaury Faye and Igor Gehenot will be visiting the lounge area of Classic 21, on the occasion of the release of their duo album. Spotted by participating in the finals of French competitions such as the National Jazz Competition of La Défense, Amaury Faye's career really took off when he moved to Brussels in 2015. In 2017, he recorded his first album under the name of Amaury Faye Trio, entitled Clearway and is awarded the Revelation award! awarded by the French magazine Jazz Magazine. In the past, the heroes of jazz in the Liège region were saxophonists, rarely pianists. Over the past thirty years, things have changed a lot: Eric Legnini at the end of the 80s, Pascal Mohy ten years later, have in turn embodied the rising generation, as Igor Gehenot does today. On stage, his cherub face changes, grimaces, suffers with delight: no doubt, he is family! A pianist who, on reinvented standards and already well-calibrated personal compositions, possessed, in a somewhat insolent way for his age, the art of making the sauce take hold. Igor Gehenot was born in Liège in 1989. A pianist mother, a designer father, Igor started playing the piano at 6 years old.

On their duo album, the two pianists face each other, the two grand pianos mirrored. Igor Gehenot and Amaury Faye sublimate pure and limpid melodies with complementarity and infinite grace. They draw from a wide variety of repertoires, from Police to Chico Buarque via original compositions oscillating between New York jazz and neo-bop, with, always, an incredible evocative power and a sweet melancholy summoning Brazilian saudade. The modern writing in which these nine pieces are carved forms a setting for the improvisatory flights of the duo, revealing the delicate combination of their piano playing. The complicity and generosity emanating from the two artists are, like their music, simply luminous.

Patrick Bivort

BRUSSELS CENTER FOR FINE ARTS - BOZAR (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

The combination of two outstanding names on the European jazz scene makes for a powerful duo. The Belgian pianist and rising star of the Belgian jazz scene, Igor Gehenot, performs in a magical collaboration with the French pianist, improviser, and composer, Amaury Faye. With their wide repertoire, these charismatic musicians will put on an incredible and enjoyable performance at Bozar. Their combined talent and chemistry make an unforgettable duet that should be experienced. 
The concert will be recorded for a new album on Hypnote Records.

Bozar - Brussels Center For Fine Arts

JAZZENZZO (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

Craig Taborn & Vijay Iyer and Fred Hersch & Bram De Looze recently set the bar very high for piano duos. The Frenchman Amaury Faye, who has been living in Brussels for years, and Igor Gehenot, who lives in Brussels from Liège, do not look back and do it their way.

With the playful opening track 'Magic Ball' we partly dive back in time when jazz pianists still created enthusiasm in gambling dens and other entertainment establishments. As if both have been accompanying the silent films in the Brussels film museum Cinematek for years. Ragtime and blues but with a contemporary twist. 'Hudson River Park' also contains the same spicy mix of blues, swing and ragtime.

A first reference to their preference for the more melodic work follows on the basis of 'Eternité', albeit with built-in tempo changes. Peculiarity here is that it is by Gehenot but Faye gets the lead role while the composer's function is limited to some percussion on the piano. Only at the end does he take the lead. The duo is not afraid to set challenges for themselves. 

'Egberto' is a tribute to the Brazilian multi-instrumentalist Egberto Gismonti with built-in choro rhythm. Their mutual passion for the country returns several times. Like in 'Incompatibilidade De Gênios' by Joâo Bosco, about the most energetic part of the album. There is also an extremely fragile and melancholic performance of 'Trocando Em Miudos' by the composer duo Chico Buarque and Francis Hime.

The pianists also venture into a number of arrangements. For example, 'Bibo No Aozora' by Ryuichi Sakamoto is on the setlist. It is a track from the soundtrack of 'Babel' (2006) and an opportunity to express yourself as two thoroughbred poets. Seamlessly following this is their version of 'Message In A Bottle', the Police hit. After several minutes, however, the tension builds and the two engage in an animated dialogue.

Don't forget to listen to the 'ghost track' that only follows a while after the CD has ended and try to recognize which song they reprise here. Another proof that they are never shy of a touch of humor. 

George Tonla-Briquet

DRAGONJAZZ (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

As its title suggests, this album is the product of the face-to-face meeting of two pianists: on the one hand, Amaury Faye, a Toulousian now based in Brussels, who has won a good number of awards including an Octave de la Musique in 2018 for Songbook (Hypnote) recorded in trio with the double bassist Giuseppe Millaci and, on the other hand, Igor Gehenot, pianist from Liège, author of four discs as a leader all released on Igloo Records and winner of two Octaves de la Musique for his participation in New Feel by the Lg Jazz Collective as well as for his Delta album.  This unprecedented project, which caused a sensation at the 2020 Gaume Jazz Festival as well as in several concert halls, confirms on disc all the interest of this remarkable collaboration. The repertoire includes nine tracks combining original compositions and rather unexpected covers such as Message In A Bottle by The Police here rendered in a luminous version so as not to write joyfully. More nostalgic appear Bibo No Aozora, a splendid theme by Ryuichi Sakamoto taken from the soundtrack of the film Babel, as well as Trocando Em Miudos by the Brazilian Chico Buarque which particularly highlights the acute sensitivity of the two performers. But the most astonishing remains the arrangement for two pianos of Incompatibilidade De Genios which keeps the rhythm and the warmth of this samba by the Brazilian Joao Bosco.

The five original tracks are also very varied, from the frenzied post-bop of a Magic Ball to the poetry of a Pare A Pluie, with its notes falling like raindrops, passing by Egberto, a tribute as playful as melodic to Brazilian composer and multi-instrumentalist Egberto Gismonti. We could ask ourselves questions about how two improvisers speaking together, and a fortiori playing the same instrument, were going to get along without falling into mimicry? But what is most remarkable here is precisely the way in which the two pianists, each with their own style, complement each other without embarrassment or redundancy. This testifies to a real artistic affinity but also, individually, to a fine mastery of the instrument combined with a clear vision of the desired result. In conclusion, it is easy to let yourself be enchanted by these colorful miniatures of intertwined pianos that combine lightness and sophistication.

Pierre Dulieu

RAMDAM (FR)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

Outstanding pianists of the new generation, Liégeois Igor and Toulouse Amaury, deliver their very personal conception of the duo. With the vivacity of mind of two natures, the energy of youth which favors impressive interlacing of keyboards, the faculty of revisiting inspiring covers, the two accomplices cross their universes brilliantly. One has shaped an open approach to classical musical worlds such as pop, blues or rock, which he reproduces with refinement, maturity and virtuosity. The second, carried by German romanticism, Anglo-Saxon music and modern jazz from the New York scene, shines with his recognized qualities as an instrumentalist and improviser. Equivalent praise greets their solo and duo work, virtuosic no matter what.

Ramdam Toulouse

LARSEN (BE)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

The duo is the art of not stepping on each other's toes. Especially when it comes to musicians playing the same instrument. In this four-handed solo, pianists Igor Gehenot and Amaury Faye together build a singular universe, at once fiery (Egberto), stride and swinging (Magic Ball) and sometimes melancholic (Trocando Em Miúdos). From this obvious complicity, we retain the desire to have fun, seriously, on tunes of bossa, contemporary jazz or even pop. Pianists have the intelligence to listen to each other, to follow each other or to let themselves be guided on other paths. We also have fun recognizing who, of the two musicians, takes the lead, who takes the other on board, who concludes. An unusual performance that doubles the pleasures.

Jacques Prouvost

JAZZ'HALO (NL)

 ENGLISH TRANSLATED

They were made to meet: same technicality, same speed of play, same sense of rhythm and melody, for the Toulousain as for the Liégeois. Amaury Faye was destined for the piano at 7, Igor at 14. One joined Berklee College in Boston at 23, where he was elected pianist of the year. In 2015, he moved to Brussels before moving to Paris in 2021. He formed a personal trio with Louis Navarro (cb) and Théo Lanau (dm), with whom he recorded Clearway then Live in Brussels. He then joined the Vogue trio of Italian-born bassist Giuseppe Millaci (Songbook and The Endless Way). Solo, he recorded Buran. Igor, after being part of the Metropolitan quartet at 16, with drummer Antoine Pierre, recorded "Road Story" then "Motion" in trio with Teun Verbruggen. With the French buglist Alex Tassel, he formed a quartet (albums “Delta” and “Cursiv”). For this duet produced by Hypnote Records, three original compositions by Igor, two by Amaury, one by the Japanese Riuychi Sakamoto, Message in a Bottle by Sting and two Brazilian melodies (João Bosco, Chico Buarque). A succession of tracks with a frenzied rhythm, with references to ragtime (Magic Ball by Igor, Egberto by Amaury), others which evoke Lennie Tristano (Hudson River Park by Amaury) or adopt a swirling rhythm (Message in a Bottle), very melodic themes (Bibo no Aozora by Sakamoto, Pare à Pluie by Igor), others, impressionist (Trocando em miudos) and very rhythmic, with a very Brazilian atmosphere (Incompatibilidade de Gênios by João Bosco). This album) the very wide artistic palette highlights the meeting of two exceptional talents.

Claude Loxhay

Craig Taborn & Vijay Iyer and Fred Hersch & Bram De Looze recently set the bar very high for piano duos. The Frenchman Amaury Faye, who has been living in Brussels for years, and Igor Gehenot, who lives in Brussels from Liège, do not look back and do it their way.

The album
With the playful opening track 'Magic Ball' we partly dive back in time when jazz pianists still created enthusiasm in gambling dens and other entertainment establishments. As if both have been accompanying the silent films in the Brussels film museum Cinematek for years. Ragtime and blues but with a contemporary twist. 'Hudson River Park' also contains the same spicy mix of blues, swing and ragtime.

A first reference to their preference for the more melodic work follows on the basis of 'Eternité', albeit with built-in tempo changes. Peculiarity here is that it is by Gehenot but Faye gets the lead role while the composer's function is limited to some percussion on the piano. Only at the end does he take the lead. The duo is not afraid to set challenges for themselves. 

'Egberto' is a tribute to the Brazilian multi-instrumentalist Egberto Gismonti with built-in choro rhythm. Their mutual passion for the country returns several times. Like in 'Incompatibilidade De Gênios' by Joâo Bosco, about the most energetic part of the album. There is also an extremely fragile and melancholic performance of 'Trocando Em Miudos' by the composer duo Chico Buarque and Francis Hime.

The pianists also venture into a number of arrangements. For example, 'Bibo No Aozora' by Ryuichi Sakamoto is on the setlist. It is a track from the soundtrack of 'Babel' (2006) and an opportunity to express yourself as two thoroughbred poets. Seamlessly following this is their version of 'Message In A Bottle', the Police hit. After several minutes, however, the tension builds and the two engage in an animated dialogue.

Don't forget to listen to the 'ghost track' that only follows a while after the CD has ended and try to recognize which song they reprise here. Another proof that they are never shy of a touch of humor. 

The concert
The live preview took place on March 29 in Pianos Maene Brussels, a piano shop with a small concert hall. Two Steinways facing each other with Faye on the left and Gehenot on the right behind them. During this concert they illustrated even more explicitly how perfectly they feel and complement each other. As accomplished relay runners, they alternately took over the role of accompanist and soloist without a sudden transition. This sophisticated role-playing was most noticeable during a drawn-out performance of 'Message In A Bottle'. It's great how the first notes sounded very familiar to the ears until they very quickly insert their personal characteristics. 

'Egberto' came across as extra spicy while the duo followed Toots Thielemans with 'Trocando Em Miudos', somewhere between a smile and a tear. For the bis number 'Incompatibilidade De Gênios', the pianists resolutely chose the latin card. An ideal ending to let the audience leave the room whistling and dancing. Even though they mentioned that this performance was mainly a laboratory work in preparation for the big concerts that are scheduled later this year, this was a more than convincing performance.