Acoustic guitarist SIMONE GUIDUCCI (an important name in Italian jazz, as his numerous collaborations with renowned artists such as Gianluigi Trovesi, Gianni Coscia, Enrico Rava, Paolo Fresu, Ralph Alessi, Erik Friedlander, Chris Speed and Don Byron attest) is back with a new CD, Storie di fiume, his fourth for Felmay after the critically acclaimed Cantador (2000), Chorale (2002) and Dancin’ Roots (2004). Accompanying GUIDUCCI as always is his refined and much vaunted Gramelot Ensemble, and their choice of material is once again a fine blend of echoes of tradition and improvisation, what has become the hallmark of Guiduccci’s style, honed to a fine art over the years, though not to the exclusion of experimentation with other forms. It’s from this aesthetic and thematic springboard that Storie di fiume takes off, reaching new peaks of excellence, an album as rich in substance as it is in collective inventiveness. On Storie di fiume what strikes the listener’s ear is precisely this fertile dialogue between the musicians whose attentive reciprocal listening enhances the music’s collective dimension while at the same time giving space to the momentary inspiration of solo flights. In this sense it goes without saying that Roberto Dani (drums and percussion), Salvatore Maiore (double bass), Fausto Beccalossi (accordion) and Achille Succi (clarinet) are the agile limbs that give body to the ‘mind’ GUIDUCCI’s compositions, structured around catchy yet unusual melodies which the guitarist weaves into sophisticated arrangements. Particulalry notable is Succi, without doubt one of the finest clarinettists of his generation, who provides new perspectives on what often seems an almost forgotten instrument The music on Storie di fiume” erupts like a torrent in full flow, borne along by a distinctly human energy that can only come from SIMONE GUIDUCCI, an artist able to express himself through sounds that embrace worlds both ancient and modern, an acoustic universe that once heard cannot easily be forgotten.