Soul jazz, as they see it, looked for the freshness and efficiency found in gospel and blues as opposed to the hard-bop of the fifties. Its greatest period, from 1960 until 1975, featured such musicians as the Hammond B3 king Jimmy Smith, Horace Silver, Lonnie Liston Smith, Lou Donaldson, John Patton, Richard “Groove” Holmes, Grant Green and the Adderley brothers among others.

Soul Voyage have known each other for quite a while, Michel Mainil and Antoine Cirri on one side and Olivier Poumay and Vincent Romain on the other. It simply took the addition of the not quite 30-year-old Maxine Moynaerts to create a warm and nostalgic music destined for those who remember this period of jazz history. It is, however, not simply a copy/paste, for the compositions are originals. Nevertheless, the first time I saw the group live, I felt as if I was listening to unknown period pieces from the past. Respect for bygone times as well as a good dose of modern improvisation are married perfectly with the instrumentation in the group, tenor and soprano sax, drums, and guitar as well as organ take care of the respect aspect and harmonica fills in the impro side. The delicious grooves of “Povo” and “Lime and Chili”, the ballad “Sweet Jail”, the clean lines of “Sunshine Alley” or the waltz “From Self to Self”, reminiscent of the mood on Bill Evans album “Affinity”. This is one Soul Voyage you won’t want to miss!

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