Phronesis has appeared at the Made in the UK series of the Rochester International Jazz Festival twice before (2011 and 2013). Discovering this band in these earlier appearances, I am looking forward to hearing how they’ve evolved in the ensuing years. Their most recent CD Parallax (affiliate link) brought me back to why I found them compelling in their earlier appearances. A 2017 recording The Behemoth (affiliate link), which they collaborateed with sax player, bandleader, arranger and conductor Julian Argüelles and the Frankfurt Radio Big Band, put a new cast on their music as a trio that brought to mind the lush compositions of Maria Schneider. Unfortunately, it’s too expensive to bring a big band on a U.S. tour, but what I heard in Parallax reminds me of why I bought their CD after hearing them in 2011. As described in Downbeat in 2016 about Parallax, "[i]magine if Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke convened a modern edition of Return to Forever that opted for acoustic instrumentation instead of electric, while retaining the high-velocity improvisational jousting and flair. Such impressions casually make their way onto Parallax, the sterling new disc from the Danish/British jazz trio Phronesis.”
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