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Reviews

Diego Piñera — Evidence
(Iapetus no#, 2025, DL)

Diego Piñera 4+4 — Romanian Dance
(Iapetus no#, 2026, DL)

by Jon Davis, Published 2026-06-13

Evidence Cover artRomanian Dance Cover art

Diego Piñera is a jazz drummer originally from Uruguay, though he’s been based in Berlin for some time now, and his music certainly takes after those European artists who incorporate Classical influences into their jazz. This is especially true on Romanian Dance, where Béla Bartók is the primary reference. As a big fan of Bartók’s music, I had high hopes for the album, and I’m happy to report that I was not disappointed. Rather than just adapting Bartók pieces for his group, Piñera builds on some of the ideas as if they were native to jazz; four of the nine tracks use Bartók as source material, one is based on Borodin’s Polovtsian Dances, while the other five are Piñera originals. Piñera’s group here is an octet, basically a jazz quartet plus a string quartet. On the jazz side, he’s joined by Igor Osypov (guitar), Peter Ehwald (saxophone), and Marcel Krömker (bass), and the strings include Semion Gurevich (violin I), Alessia Laurora (violin II), Joaquín León Fernández (viola), and Elisabet Iserte López (cello). Eastern European rhythmic patterns are infused into the music in a very natural way — we’ve come a long way since Dave Brubeck gave us “Blue Rondo a la Turk.” As expected Osypov and Ehwald are the primary soloists, and they’re both great players. Osypov’s tone is fluid and not rock-inflected, reminding me at times of Pat Metheny. Ehwald is often on the soprano sax, and he avoids the overly sweet, smooth tone you often hear from the instrument. Piñera’s drumming is superb, approaching the odd meters with a jazzy touch rather than what you often hear from players with a rock background. The string arrangements are outstanding, totally integrating into the overall sound, with complex interactions and dynamics. Romanian Dance is one of my favorite jazz albums of the year so far.

On another note, in 2025 Diego Piñera released a trio EP called Evidence with John Patitucci on bass and David Kikoski on piano. While I can’t fault the players or their work, it’s a much more ordinary take on jazz that I find much less interesting than Romanian Dance. Fans of Patitucci or Kikoski will want to check it out, but compared to the work with the string quartet, it’s much more mainstream

Filed under: New releases, 2025 releases, 2026 releases

Related artist(s): Diego Piñera

More info
http://diegopinera.bandcamp.com/album/romanian-dance
http://diegopinera.bandcamp.com/album/evidence

 

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