Habanera

An early album by the Simple Acoustic Trio — pianist Marcin Wasilewski, bassist Sławomir Kurkiewicz, and drummer Michał Miśkiewicz — recorded in Warsaw in 1999, years before the group became internationally known. Childhood friends who had played together since their teens under the mentorship of Tomasz Stańko, the trio would soon become Stańko’s celebrated rhythm section and, under the name Marcin Wasilewski Trio, one of ECM’s signature European groups. Habanera, issued by Not Two in 2000, is a key document of that formative period, capturing the band at a moment when their collective identity was crystallizing.

What stands out is how much of the trio’s later aesthetic is already present. The music is marked by the lyrical, intuitive interplay that would become their hallmark: Wasilewski’s melodic clarity and unhurried phrasing, Kurkiewicz’s supple, singing bass lines, and Miśkiewicz’s finely detailed, quietly propulsive drumming. Even at this early stage, their communication feels telepathic — a shared sense of space, timing, and restraint that sets them apart from most young piano trios of the era.

The album also hints at the broader artistic trajectory that would define their work with Stańko and later on ECM: a balance of lyricism and abstraction, a sensitivity to form, and an ability to let the music breathe without losing momentum. Heard today, Habanera is more than a youthful snapshot — it is a revealing chapter in the evolution of one of Europe’s most distinctive jazz trios, showing three musicians already moving with a unified voice long before the world knew their names.