On his debut CD, Cocktail Jazz, Finn tickles the ivories on standards present and past, nostalgically evoking the stately, deliberate qualities of Erroll Garner.
THE NASHVILLE SCENE          
September 29, 2005 Volume 22, Issue 35
                            Read more...
                        

                            
Leo Finn was a revelation the first time I heard him: big technique, deep knowledge of jazz harmony and phrasing, and above all a real feel for the American Songbook repertoire. That’s how I felt that first night at Café 123 here in Nashville and I feel that way today as well – only more so. What I didn’t grasp at the time is precisely what every track on his Cocktail Jazz album makes clear: Leo also knows how to play the room.

Let me explain. It was a quiet night at 123 when Leo, who I didn’t know at the time, sat in for a few tunes – a pianist myself, I always enjoy hearing a fellow tickler show his stuff. What he played was perfect for that moment: intimate, a little bluesy, elegant without being stuffy. To be honest, he sounds completely different on Cocktail Jazz, but what he’s playing is entirely right for this disc. His sound is big but never insensitive, his chords are full and expressive, his rhythm swings in an understated way, all of which serves to discover and showcase what makes each of these songs a classic.

Most impressive is Leo’s fidelity to the melody. Too many pianists – I’m guilty of this myself – stray too far from the tune as they stretch through their improvisations. Leo takes a more compositional approach: He plays the way the great writers write, with insight into how to shade the rise and fall of each passage. Maybe that comes from knowing his way around the real classics, as his rendition of Barber’s “Dreamboat” suggests. More likely it’s just something he was born with and has had the good judgment to nurture.

I’ve heard Leo in other settings since that night at Café 123, from elegant and intimate to boisterous, even rowdy. No matter where he plays, he sounds right at home. And on Cocktail Jazz he plays for your home too, wherever that may be. From ragtime to the contemporary romanticism of Cats, he handles it all throughout this disc with class and style.

He plays the room, in other words. And no matter the time, place, or occasion, there’s room for Cocktail Jazz.

Robert L. Doerschuk
Author, 88: The Giants of Jazz Piano
                            Read more...