At the end of October the Trio Vander played the east of France with two gigs at the Strasbourgian Café des Anges on the 27th and 28th, followed by one in Metz on the 30th. Circumstances, unfortunately only allowed me to go to the concert in Metz. Once there, "Les Trinitaires" was easily found, in something like an old romantic cloister at 10-12 rue des Trinitaires, just a few corners around the back of the cathedral. I soon learnt how important it is to make a ticket reservation, which I hadn't done this time. Subsequently I had to wait for nearly two hours in a long gallery at the front entrance of the "cave", until all the reserved seats had been taken. It was announced that the concert was nearly sold out, but nine or ten seats were left. I was ninth in the queue, so I was not very worried, but everyone who arrived was asked if they had made a reservation. Even Emmanuel Borghi was asked when the Vander Three turned up, he spontaneously replied that he had reserved the seat behind the piano.
At 9 o'clock we entered the underworld of Metz, where the "Caveau des Trinitaires" turned out to be an old barrel-vault, which would later on deliver a very fine and well-balanced sound, despite its small size. All the seats were occupied except for some chairs in the aisle. I got one in the last row, just behind a platform with the seats on. When the first of two sets, each lasting sixty minutes, began at 9:30, I had to forget about watching the drummer, because the seats on the stand in front of me obstructed my view. Emmanuel Borghi had his back to me and the visual limitation of just Philippe Dardelle's finger-work on the upright bass induced me to concentrate on what reached my ears. Don't expect a complete set-list, but the concert began with the piece they generally start with, which I believe is 'The Night Has A Thousand Eyes'. This was followed by the complete stuff from the new release '65!' and some older pieces like a stunning version of 'Dear Mac' and the as yet unrecorded 'Body and Soul'.
It is very important to realize the remarkable growth the Trio had made during the last year. Emmanuel Borghi has become an excellent pianist since he joined the U.Z. in 1987. But now he is also playing as a superb complement to Christian Vander's drum works, with blind comprehension between both of them, to the level Michel Graillier delivered in the early '80s with ALIEN, in spite of the many differences in their style of playing. Likewise Philippe Dardelle did quite well, giving the rhythmical frame to both the others, maybe comparable in function to what Jimmy Garrison did for John Coltrane with his dry playing. And no doubt about Christian Vander's techniques; as always at live shows, the energy expressed by his presence and his drum work was an impressive experience, but also he seemed to be much more florid than during the previous few months, apparently on the way to a new peak.
This impression of a really remarkable high standard of playing together that all three have reached at present was intensely underlined too at the Trio's appearance at the Bataclan events recently. And not to forget the two melodies by Emmanuel Borghi, 'Tensions' and especially 'Skunkadelic's', which I heard for the first time live in Metz, and also the CD's title track '65!', a composition by Christian Vander, to represent a composer's potential, which suggests that they should change over to playing their own material in their future repertoire, more than the standards they have played for years now. So one could not wonder at the enthusiastic applause when the second set ended with the band's introductions by C.V. Let's hope that they will decide to preserve some of the intensity that they delivered playing live for us, on AKT in the near future.