Album Description
Surging with pulse-quickening grooves, drenched in Third World exotica, charged with improvisational abandon and teeming with typical machismo,
Faces & Places is quintessential
Joe Zawinul. Now in his 70th year, the maestro shows no signs of slowing down artistically as he pushes the envelope on this exhilarating ride. Indeed, the ever-prolific, relentlessly creative synth wizard and bandleader seems to bring his keyboard virtuosity, expansive pan-global vision and Austrian soul to a laser-like focus on this extraordinary outing. Once again, he is accompanied by an international cast including Cameroonian bassists Richard Bona and Etienne Mbappe, the incomparable Ivory Coast drummer Paco Sery, north Indians Amit Chatterjee on guitar and vocals and Zakir Hussain on tablas, Belgian-African singer Sabine Kabongo, Peruvian percussionist Alex Acuna, Venezuelan percussionist Rudy Regalado, Puerto Rican percussionist Manolo Badrena, Brazilian singer Maria Joao and Americans Dean Brown on guitar, Victor Bailey on bass and Bobby Malach on tenor saxophone.