| Jazz |
In the increasingly transnational world of contemporary jazz, where artists migrate between continents and idioms with the same ease that listeners shift between platforms, Francesca Prihasti stands as a quietly compelling figure. Indonesia is not yet the first country that comes to mind when tracing the geography of today’s jazz vanguard, especially in New York, a city whose gravitational pull has long shaped musicians from Korea, Israel, Brazil, and Northern Europe. Yet Prihasti, with her poised pianism and compositional clarity, has joined this wider Southeast Asian emergence, adding her own distinct voice to a musical conversation that is becoming more global by the year.
Listening to her latest set of compositions, one would never guess her origins based on any superficial markers. Instead, the music speaks the language of someone who has absorbed several traditions, European classical lyricism, traces of rock’s harmonic bite, and the reflective poise of modern jazz, then recombined them into a grammar that feels personal rather than derivative. Her pieces open like chambers in a carefully crafted architectural space: lines interlock, rhythms pivot subtly, and melodies arc with a narrative inevitability.
Her harmonic world often leans toward impressionist colors, intervals that recall Debussy or Ravel without quoting them, progressions that move with a gentle asymmetry, patterns that momentarily suspend gravity before resolving. Yet her rhythmic structures carry a different DNA: clear, grounded, quietly propulsive, often built around motifs that evolve rather than cycle. It’s not hard to hear how the clarity of her writing and arranging contributed to her 2017 selection to represent the New York University jazz department in Costa Rica with the East Eleventh Collective. There is a kind of architectural rigor in her work, precise without being rigid, ambitious without ornament.
And still, for all its complexity, nothing about Prihasti’s music feels designed to impress. Instead, it approaches the listener with the discreet confidence of a Swiss watchmaker: each piece is calibrated, each transition deliberate, each silence intentional. On first listen, the music feels serene. On the second, it reveals an intricate machinery beneath the surface. On the third, you begin to sense the story she is telling, a story built not on dramatic flourishes but on the quiet tension between shadow and light.
This subtlety is best appreciated under the right listening conditions. A well-built HIFI system or a balanced studio setup is not merely a luxury but a portal into the world the music inhabits. The brushed textures, the interplay of harmonic overtones, the micro-rubatos between piano and guitar, all of it benefits from a sound environment capable of honoring the fragility and precision of the performances. In an age when much listening happens through laptop speakers, Prihasti’s work stands as a reminder that certain albums require, and reward, full attention.
Her recorded journey traces an arc through three earlier albums:
- Adriana (2019): Nic Vardanega (guitar), Drew Gress (bass), Josh Roberts (drums), Alan Ferber (trombone), Dave Pietro (reeds), Mike Rodriguez (trumpet & flugelhorn)
- Evolving (2016): Nic Vardanega (guitar), Rodney Green (bass), Orlando Le Fleming (drums)
- Night Trip (2015): Ulysses Owens Jr. (drums), Marco Panascia (double bass), Nic Vardanega (guitar)
Having Ulysses Owens Jr. on a debut album is, by itself, a form of early recognition, the kind that signals an artist whose musical vision others take seriously. But perhaps the more revealing constant in Prihasti’s work is guitarist Nic Vardanega, the only musician to appear on all of her recordings, and once again a key collaborator on the forthcoming album slated for release on January 9, 2026. Their partnership feels less like convenience and more like a long conversation unfolding across years. Their cultural differences remain audible in the best possible way: she, with her blend of classical poise and narrative sensibility; he, with a guitar voice that navigates between clarity and warmth. Together, they form one of the album’s central illuminations.
The emotional core of the record, however, lies in the trust she gives her ensemble. You hear it most vividly in the third track, “Reason and Will,” where the drumming astonishes not through display but through intention, each gesture measured, each accent essential, turning complexity into something that breathes. The following piece, “Laura,” drifts in with a double-bass line that feels like a spell being cast in real time, anchoring the narrative while expanding its emotional range.
Behind this narrative lies a team of engineers who have shaped the album’s sonic identity with remarkable sensitivity. Peter Karl of Acoustic Recording captures each instrument with a realism that borders on intimacy, allowing the listener to hear not only tones but textures, the contact between wood and string, the resonance of a piano’s lower register, the bloom of a guitar chord. His meticulous recording is then treated with respect rather than intervention by mastering engineer Tyler McDiarmid, whose touch preserves the album’s dynamic integrity rather than compressing it for loudness. In a musical world saturated with algorithm-optimized mixes, their work feels almost radical in its restraint.
A jazz album is often judged by its solos, its writing, or its conceptual ambition. But this one reminds us that great recordings are ecosystems. They begin with imaginative compositions, continue with musicians who listen as deeply as they play, and are completed by technicians who labor in silence so the music may speak without interference. Francesca Prihasti’s new release is such an ecosystem, a work of quiet conviction in an age of noise, and a testament to the power of nuance at a time when nuance is too easily overlooked.
Thierry De Clemensat
Member at Jazz Journalists Association
USA correspondent for Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor in chief – Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News
PARIS-MOVE, November 20th 2025
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To buy this album (January 9, 2026)
Musicians :
Francesca Prihasti, piano
Nic Vernadega, guitar
Drew Gress, double bass
Nick Brust, alto & soprano saxophone
Track Listing :
In Between
Beneath The Sun
Reason And Will
Laura
T’ill We Have Faces
Unanswered Questions
Fortitude