Trio di Parma was formed in 1990 at the A. Boito conservatory of music in Parma, Italy, and went on to further studies with the Trio di Trieste at the Fiesole School of Music in Florence and the Accademia Chigiana in Siena. In 2000 the Trio was invited to partecipate in the Isaac Stern Chamber Music Workshop at Carnegie Hall in New York.

Over the past 15 years, I have focused my musical career on scoring soundtracks for movies and television; and while it has been creative and productive, I have missed the pleasure and inspiration of performing and recording improvised music. Then two years ago, out of the blue (not blues…), I got a call from an old high school friend, Mervon Mehta, the musical director of the prestigious Koerner Hall in Toronto, asking me to perform in his 2017 Jazz Trio series, opening for the Christian McBride Trio. Although hesitant at first, being very busy working on films, I started to embrace the idea of getting back into performing, putting a trio together, and creating a repertoire for the concert.

The sleeve tells you so much about the process. It's a picture of a lone figure. Suited up and immersed in interplanetary protective gear, he walks out across unmapped terrain. In the distance, a mountain range towers over the roughly gridded sand he's striding. This is very much a solo mission - giant steps into the unknown. Inside the helmet, there's all the uncertainty and madness that such a pursuit brings.

Torun Eriksen's 'Luxury and Waste', her sixth solo album, explores familiar territory in an utterly unfamiliar way. Where her previous album 'Grand White Silk' flirted with arrangements of grandeur, she turns now in the opposite direction and gives us new songs in an uncompromising, stripped back sound, shifting between cool, drifting moods and driving pulsating rhythms. Bassist Kjetil Dalland is her sole companion here, and his subtle yet distinctive style is the perfect complement to Torun's voice, as she invites us into 'Luxury and Waste', her most intimate album yet. You will find Jazz, pop and soul, singer/songwriter and blues, all combined in Eriksen's unique and surprising blend. "I love how music can burst with references, and still have a distinct sound of its own. And I wanted this album to be like that. I have been searching for the core of my songs. We cut everything to the bone, were left with the raw and unpolished and tried to bring this very special light only to be found in the sketches, onto our final versions of the songs."