01/02/2024
Kurun/Trios/Pixie/1996
Personnel:
Yann CARIOU - Wood flute
Roland CONQ - Acoustic guitar
Yann-Fañch LE COZ - Bombard FA
Kurun (thunder in Breton) was an innovative Fest Noz group in the late 90s and turn of the century. Talabarder (bombard player) Yann-Fañch Le Coz first introduced flutist Yann Cariou and guitarist Roland Conq in 1995. The following year, they recorded this first album, Trios. This reviewer discovered Trios by unlikely accident - someone had special ordered the import CD from overseas and then never picked it up. Eventually the record store put it out on the shelf, where my tender young eyes locked onto the gorgeous cover art with surprised glee and extreme excitement.
These three musicians, all from the Kerne or Cornouaille region, drew their repertoire from the areas of Dardoub and Aven, with some influences from Loudia and also, surprisingly, on the final track, Xandru, from the vaguely related music tradition from Asturies in Spain. They were also influenced by other genres such as jazz, with a tendency towards improvisation in performance. At the time, Kurun received, to some degree, short shrift from some quarters of the Breton milieu for supposedly being derivative of the seminal group Gwerz. Decades later, in hindsight we can easily see that these criticisms were unfounded and the sounds of the two groups have little in common.
It is therefore unfortunate that Kurun never received the plaudits and critical momentum that Gwerz did. While both Cariou and especially Conq went on to great success in other projects, Le Coz mostly disappeared from the music scene. Le Coz’s use of a lower-pitched bombard in F was significantly ahead of its time and combined beautifully with Cariou’s flute, which had a more powerful presence than almost any other flute in Breton music since. Conq’s guitar parts shined with lovely, complex chordal and melodic details that had a quality not easily comparable to any other player.
So here we have a talented young group producing superb material at the height of the era, before digital piracy and streaming services disrupted the economics of the recording industry. While recording technology has obviously moved past aspects of this recording, Trios stands today as a vibrant classic, a deeply interesting, unique take on Breton music. We note that three years later, with the addition of percussionist Pierre Le Toux, Kurun would release their second and final recording, Kej Mej, on the Déclic label, of which many of the same things could be said as regards Trios.
-Fañch
