Anöna Trio

All Saints Church, Hove

Saturday 11th May, 2019

The Anöna Trio of Julian Nicholas, Imogen Ryall and Mark Edwards recently released their debut album, One January Morning. For their performance at All Saints Church, pianist Simon Robinson stepped in to replace Mark Edwards and performed admirably.

They began with Brad Mehldau’s When It Rains, a tune that will be familiar to fans of Mark Edwards’ The Cloggz, with some beautiful lyrics written by Ryall, and some impressive soloing from Robinson and Nicholas.

Whilst tunes with soprano saxophone worked best with the cathedral-like acoustics of such a large church, it was Nicholas’ tenor sax playing on ballads like If I Should Lose You that were the most remarkable.

The title track of the new album, One January Morning, included absorbing original lyrics by Ryall and featured intense and ethereal melodic lines from Julian Nicholas on soprano saxophone.

Along with the impressive musicianship of Simon Robinson and Julian Nicholas, it was Imogen Ryall’s vocal abilities and lyric writing that were the most memorable.

Charlie Anderson

Imogen Ryall, vocals; Julian Nicholas, tenor and soprano saxophones; Simon Robinson, piano.

Photos by Anya Arnold.