Appearing at Brilliant Corners later this month with Human, playing on the same nine-foot Steinway Joanna MacGregor will be using a few days later in Belfast venue the MAC, Alexander Hawkins has a new trio album to be released a few weeks later simply titled Alexander Hawkins Trio.

Out in mid-April it is to be released on his own label, and will be launched in east London venue Cafe Oto on 13 April.

The trio, Oxford-born Hawkins – known for his own groups including Decoy and the Covergence Quartet and for his appearances with Louis Moholo-Moholo as well as his long-established presence in Mulatu Astatke’s Step Ahead band – is here with Zed-U bassist Neil Charles and Sons of Kemet drummer Tom Skinner. Both were heard on the pianist’s larger ensemble album from 2013, Step Wide, Step Deep.

The trio play eight of Hawkins’ compositions: ‘Sweet Duke’, ‘Song Singular - Owl (friendly) – Canon,’ ‘One Tree Found,’ ‘Perhaps 5 or 6 Different Colours,’ ‘40HB (for Taylor Ho Bynum),’ ‘AHRA,’ ‘Baobabs + SGrA*’ and ‘Blue Notes for a Blue Note (Joy To You).’ These were all recorded in London studio Fish Factory in October 2014, the first and third compositions adaptations from a larger ensemble work commissioned by the BBC two years earlier. Three of the remaining tracks were commissioned by the London Jazz Festival and first performed at the festival in 2013.

The Guardian writer Richard Williams, incoming artistic director of JazzFest Berlin, in the liner notes quotes Hawkins: “In a lot of my compositions the decision-making is devolved. While the music should be clearly identifiable as my own, it’s not hierarchical in the sense that the bandleader defines everything. Other musicians can give cues, or the bass and drums can take themselves off on a path that’s not related to what I’m doing. That’s the kind of equality in which I’m interested.”

Hawkins returns to Ireland the day before the trio album launch for a solo piano concert at Dublin’s Hugh Lane Gallery 

Alexander Hawkins, above

Photo: Edu Hawkins