Round the world with samba: Henrik Meurkens fuses his harmonica with WDR Big Band

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Dutch-German harmonica maestro Henrik Meurkens

 Inherently unaggressive and seductive in tone, the harmonica can also be a voice of unexpected power in the hands of a player as adept as Henrik Meurkens. Performances of such pieces as "Body and Soul" with a small group on YouTube can incline you to think of this constantly exploring musician as the John Coltrane of the harmonica. That's how much variety of harmony and rhythm he can put into his improvising.

His fitness for all contexts is often narrowed to a samba focus, yet appears as navigationally windswept as the sailboat on the cover of "Samba Jazz Odyssey" (Zoho). This disc provides a glorious big-band setting for Meurkens' most familiar genre, the samba. Here the soft-focus nature of the harmonica is at home, and Meurkens never seems to run out of ways to make the instrument sing. 

Based in Cologne, Germany, the WDR Big Band has long collaborated with eminent soloists, many of them U.S.-based, as Meurkens has been for many years. His solo playing neatly folds into the large-ensemble arrangements (conducted by Michael Philip Mossman) from the first track on. 

Immediately after "A Night in Jakarta," we get a change of atmosphere in "Manhattan Samba," with its more bristling edge signaled by the unison sax and trumpet lines at the start. Bent tones become more conspicuous in Meurkens' solo.

"Prague in March" spotlights Meurkens against the rhythm section, a reduction in force with which the star is thoroughly comfortable. The harmonica solo just flies in the airborne freedom of "Sambatropolis." The notion of making a variety of settings suitable for  soloist and big band is confirmed by the open-road cruising in "Mountain Drive," smooth with some big accents.

"You Again" achieves even greater variety by incorporating a string of WDR solos. Billy Test, an American who was among the finalists in the last American Pianists Awards in jazz, plays a fine solo in "Bolero Para Paquito," another Meurkens original, like most of the set. "Samba Tonto" is notable for the interplay between Meurkens and Paul Shigihara's guitar. 

All told, the concentration on Meurkens' affinity with the Afro-Brazilian genre never becomes tiresome. The level of inspiration, and the execution required to support it, remains high throughout.

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