Marius Neset: Pinball review – award-winning saxophonist goes to another level

Last month, 29-year-old saxophonist Marius Neset won Norway’s multi-genre Spellemannprisen award, for his orchestral album Lion. The prize rightly recognises one of the hottest European jazz talents of recent years. Neset burst on to the scene in 2011 as an exceptional sax player, having already put his teacher Django Bates’ outré composing methods to very personal use, and has continued advancing at startling speed. Pinball adds occasional strings and flute to Neset’s fine quintet (with Britons Ivo Neame and Jim Hart, Bates’ bassist Petter Eldh, and Phronesis drummer Anton Eger). Though some might tire at this set’s breathless, jam-packed mutability, there is a balance between the frenetic and the reflective. The folk and world-music sweep of its snaking melodies, the subtlety of its tonal contrasts and its mix of intensity and insinuation make Pinball another step-change in Neset’s already spectacular career.