The Weather Acoustic Samy Thiébault & Émilie Aridon-Kociołek

• 1 Teen Town (Intro) 01:46
• 2 Teen Town 04:08
• 3 Havona 05:02
• 4 Black Market 06:10
• 5 Birdland 04:54
• 6 Three Views of a Secret 05:34
• 7 River People 04:25
• 8 Five Short Stories, Pt. 1 01:51
• 9 Five Short Stories, Pt. 2 00:46
• 10 Five Short Stories, Pt. 3 02:22
• 11 Five Short Stories, Pt. 4 01:57
• 12 Five Short Stories, Pt. 5 00:36
• Total Runtime 39:31

Info for The Weather Acoustic

Beyond its phenomenal popular success and an aesthetic that has left its mark on generations, Weather Report’s music reveals a body of work of impressive richness, dominated by two exceptional composers: Wayne Shorter and Joe Zawinul, who were later joined by the meteoric bassist Jaco Pastorius.

‘The Weather Acoustic’, featuring Samy Thiebault (saxophone) and Emilie Aridon-Kociołek (piano), revisits the iconic compositions of this legendary group in an intimate and entirely acoustic setting, transforming them to better reveal their richness and timeless character. Each track is presented as a suite in which, alongside these melodies deeply rooted in the collective unconscious, coexist variations, extrapolations and other reflections devised by Samy Thiebault.

We thus discover a new, more introspective facet of this unique artist, in closer communion with the saxophone within a novel acoustic setting alongside an exceptional musician: Emilie Aridon-Kociołek, a pupil of Michel Béroff, Claire Désert and Bertrand Chamayou.

The challenge facing Samy Thiebault here is to devise a programme written entirely for a musician who rarely improvises. The piano parts were therefore conceived during lengthy writing sessions and tailor-made for the pianist of Polish origin.

Against this inspiring backdrop, Emilie Aridon-Kociołek reveals the qualities of a fiery performer, with an infinite expressive range. Her sense of movement offers Samy Thiébault a playground that transforms his perspective as an improviser and leads him into realms he himself seemed unaware existed. It is the sheer audacity of this extraordinary project that is rewarded here, such is the magic of this unprecedented collaboration.

With the strong backing of the wide-ranging producer Daniel Yvinec, the two artists chart uncharted territory at the boundaries of genres and together rise to a formidable challenge, spurred on by their mutual support in the face of this monument of jazz history. And to further enhance our enjoyment of this encounter, subtle electro-acoustic treatments – acting as fleeting sonic illusions – take us on a journey where the familiar constantly rubs shoulders with the unknown.

Samy Thiébault, saxophone tenor, flute alto, arrangements, compositions
Émilie Aridon-Kociołek, piano

Samy Thiébault,
Born in Côte d'Ivoire, Samy Thiébault studied classical music at the Bordeaux Conservatoire before joining the jazz class at the Paris Conservatoire in 2004. He graduated in 2008. At the same time as his musical studies, he obtained a master's degree in Philosophy (summa cum laude) at the Sorbonne (2001).

Blues For Nel was released in 2004, followed by Gaya Scienza in 2007 and Upanishad Expériences in 2010 (the first album to be produced by his own label, Gaya Music Productions). Clear Fire was released in 2013. It was also at that time that he began working extensively with dance, theatre and film: music for the dance show Les Autres Sois in 2022, Nadir Mokneche's film, L'Air de la mer, in 2023, and Edouard Tissot's En Son Absence in 2014. In 2013, he was appointed Professor of Jazz and Saxophone at the Choisy-le-Roi Conservatoire.

The release in 2015 of Feast Of Friends, a tribute to The Doors, was a major turning point in Samy's career, and led him to invite the great trumpeter Avishai Cohen for his album Rebirth in 2016.

In 2018, he released Caribbean Stories, the first part of a triptych on Creolisation. It is an album in the form of a subjective journey to the heart of the Caribbean. In her preface to the album, Minister Christiane Taubira wrote: "In all likelihood, Samy Thiébault has perceived the plasticity of this music. They vary. They rarely shout, they take care of their geographical roots as much as they maintain their cultural branches, much less, however, than they bear witness to the blows and upheavals that gave them birth, to the abyss from which they come, to the edge of the abyss that they have assiduously frequented, unwillingly. From the chaos that gave them substance. And a rumbling serenity".

In September 2019, Samy Thiébault released a project fulfilling a dream he has had for over ten years: to write a suite for symphony orchestra and jazz quintet, uniting the worlds of 20th-century French music, black American spiritual jazz of the 1960s and Indian classical music. Thanks to a powerful encounter with the Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne, conductor Aurélien Azan Zielinsky and sound engineer Philippe Teissier Du Cros. The album, Symphonic Tales, marks the start of a new adventure for the saxophonist and his band.

The year 2021 saw the release of “Awé!”, an ambitious album recorded in Miami, Cuba, France, and Sao Polo, containing rich and varied influences. The album was also the final part of Samy’s triptych on Creolization. The saxophonist invited the best musicians of the Cuban diaspora to play on the album: Dafnis Prieto (drummer, composer, winner of the Thelonious Monk Competition, Grammy Award 2019), pianist Manuel Valera, Brian Lynch on trumpet (ex-Jazz Messengers, Grammy Award 2020), and Yunior Terry on double bass. Pianist Éric Legnini, a close friend of the saxophonist and one of the most talented pianists in Europe in addition to being a seasoned producer. A string orchestra and chamber orchestra joined the core group on the record.

The saxophonist has played with his group on every continent and at the major European and world festivals and venues (Olympia, Marciac, Nice, Sète, Marseille, Moscow, Montreal, Medellín, Hong Kong, New York, and more). His playing, “Coltranian in the best sense of the word” (Nouvel Obs), “with its dance-like discourse somewhere between trance and spiritual message” (Libération), places him among the “most important and emblematic musicians of his generation” (France Inter), making him “one of France’s country's greatest jazzmen” (JazzNews).

In addition to his numerous critical distinctions (the press is also unanimous: qualified as Indispensable in JazzNews, 4 stars in Jazzmag, a “Coup de Coeur” for France Musique, best album two years in a row for TSF), he has twice made the front page of JazzNews and appeared on the cover of Télérama in 2022. He was nominated in the Best Album category at the 2019 Victoires du Jazz awards, as well as Best Musician of the Year as part of the 2022 Django Reinhardt Prize.Samy won the 2023 Sacem/France Musique prize for best film score for his work on Nadir Moknèche’s feature film, L’air de la mer rend libre (You Promised Me the Sea).

In Waves, Samy's latest album, just released this fall 2024, features a much more intimate, poetic, and socially engaged content than ever before. Not only does he play with his quartet, but he uses sequencers and electronic music elements, whose common gravitational pull is the Ocean…

Émilie Aridon-Kociołek
Introduced to music at an early age by her family, Emilie Aridon showed an obvious talent for the piano and gave her first recital in the Polish town of Zywiec at the age of 9.

At the age of 12, she entered the Conservatoire Régional de Paris in Pierre Reach's class. At just 14, she obtained her Diplôme d'Etudes Musicales and joined Denis Pascal's class at the Conservatoire de Rueil. At the same time, she took chamber music classes at the Paris Conservatoire with Paul Meyer and Eric le Sage. In 2010, Emilie Aridon was admitted to the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris in Michel Béroff' s class, where she studied with such artists as Claire Désert, Bertrand Chamayou, Marc Coppey and Romano Pallottini.

She has won numerous national and international competitions in France and abroad, and has chosen to play the widest possible repertoire, ranging from baroque music to contemporary music, in which she has a keen interest.....

A keen chamber musician, she performs in duo with her twin sister, pianist Juliette Aridon, as well as with her fellow students at the Paris Conservatoire, pianists Julie Alcaraz and Esther Assuied.

Alongside her classical career, Emilie Aridon is also a pianist and arranger with Quinteto Respiro.

This album contains no booklet.