Wolfgang Haffner - Life Rhythm Live2-CD / 2-LP / digitalWolfgang Haffner drums Sebastian Studnitzky trumpetArto Mäkelä guitarSimon Oslender keyboardsThomas Stieger bassWolfgang Haffner is one of the most in-demand musicians in European jazz and certainly its most successful drummer-bandleader. He has the kind of full-on schedule in which a series of concerts in Japan can segue straight into an extensive European tour... followed by a short stop-off for a meeting in Ingolstadt – where he’s now in his second year in charge of the programming of the Ingolstädter Jazztage festival – and then off again. Wolfgang Haffner has brought about a remarkable transformation in his career. He has emerged from being a figure in the background in bands led by artists such as Al Jarreau, Jan Garbarek and Nils Landgren, into the kind of bandleader who really sets the tone; it is a role to which he is particularly well attuned and suited. Furthermore, whereas his studio albums such as the most recent, ‘Life Rhythm’, put a focus on high production values and the careful creation of deeply relaxed flow, the new album ‘Life Rhythm - Live’ has not only captured all that finesse and deep craft, it also conveys the kicking energy and dynamic buzz of Haffner's live concerts. The album also demonstrates why – uniquely – concerts by Wolfgang Haffner consisting solely of his own music in the largest concert halls are always sold out in advance. For the ‘Life Rhythm’ album recording and tour, Wolfgang Haffner put together a dream team. ‘Both keyboard player Simon Oslender and bassist Thomas Stieger have been in virtually all my musical ventures in recent years,’ he notes. ‘Trumpeter Sebastian Studnitzky was already part of some of my earlier bands. And when I met guitarist Arto Mäkelä about two years ago, his empathetic playing immediately left a very strong impression on me. With him, the band was fully in place as a complete unit, I had put my dream team together’. Haffner wrote the songs for the album “Life Rhythm” with the personalities of these musicians in mind, and the disc was released in the summer of 2024. In the autumn of the same year, the band went on tour, playing many of Germany's finest concert halls. And here, too, Haffner fulfilled a dream: ‘It was a pretty elaborate production, including a five-person crew, sophisticated lighting and sound, a real dramaturgy from start to finish, without any need to compromise or save on costs.’Plans fell into place immediately. As Haffner remembers: ‘The band gelled perfectly from the first second, and just grew day by day. What we did together night after night really was quite an accomplishment. And it was clear to me from the start that we should capture the show on a live album.’ Wolfgang Haffner loves the live situation, all that alchemy of what can happen between the notes. He manages to strike a balance between pre-planning and freedom. Gentle acoustic passages are contrasted with more emphatic moments which are precisely planned, and for which sound and light are in synch. His fellow musicians, all of them experienced in both jazz and pop, follow their leader with an instinctive ease and precision into an in-between world where fusion, electric jazz and rock meet and coalesce. And the audience is with them every step of the way. Standing ovations follow. Everywhere. Naturally.In addition to some tracks from the last studio album, ‘Life Rhythm Live’ also delves into Haffner’s back-catalogue. The bandleader has rearranged some earlier songs: ‘Leo’, ‘Nacho’, ‘Simple Life’, ‘Homerun’ and the frequently requested ‘Keep Going’ for the current line-up. There is a seamless fit with newer, more obviously dramatic repertoire. On the one hand, the album is a statement of where he is now, but it is also a summation, already turning new pages and hinting as to what might happen next. And that is because Wolfgang Haffner – who this year celebrates 50 years since first appearing on stage – still has plenty of plans for the future: ‘I am very grateful to be able to make a living from music. More than ever, I have tremendous fun playing the drums, writing new music and performing new musical ideas with wonderful people on stages all over the world for an audience that I love.’ This simple and candid expression of joy happens to sum up the recipe for Wolfgang Haffner’s remarkable success, for why it has endured so well, and why it will continue. CreditsAlbum produced, arranged & mixed by Wolfgang HaffnerMastered by Marko Schneider at Skywalk MasteringRecorded live by Jochen Etzel during the Life Rhythm tour in Germany, November 2024Tour organized by Karsten Jahnke Konzertdirektion
Nils Landgren & Swedish Radio ChoirSandström: Sonnets of Darkness and LoveCD / digitalNils Landgren trombone & vocalsSwedish Radio ChoirKaspars Putniņš music directorALBUM NOTES BY NILS LANDGRENOn October 18, 2018, I received an email from the Danish choir leader and former trombone colleague Mogens Dahl. He wrote: “I have this idea to have the Swedish composer Sven-David Sandström write a piece for mixed choir, plus your trombone and vocals — nothing else. As a former trombone player, I have a certain affinity for the instrument, and I really like the way you play and sing. Sven-David is unwell but is willing to start writing immediately. Can we meet, maybe at the publisher’s office?”That was the beginning of this wonderful project. We met on November 13 at 10:00 a.m. at the office of the publisher Gehrmans in Stockholm, and it was a very special and heartwarming encounter. Mogens and the librettist, Jakob Holtze, were new acquaintances, but I already knew Sven-David from several events at the Royal Academy of Music, where we had often expressed mutual appreciation for each other’s work.Despite his illness, Sven-David was full of energy, and it was an exhilarating experience to sit down with one of the great composers of our time, discussing a piece he would write specifically for Mogens’ choir and me, with lyrics curated by Jakob. What an incredible honor. On April 4, 2019, we received an email from the CEO of Gehrmans, Gunnar Helgesson, stating: “Astonishing news. Sven-David has already finished the piece! A scanned manuscript will be available at your next meeting.” On May 6 of that same year, I met with Mogens, Jakob, and Sven-David’s wife, Anne-Marie, at Dalen Hospital outside Stockholm. Sven-David, though visibly marked by his illness, still had a spark in his eyes. He showed us some of the music, and it was deeply moving to witness the master at work.
It was also the last time I saw him. On June 10, Sven-David passed away, surrounded by his family — a sad day indeed. I often recall something Sven-David said during our first meeting, a comment that lingers in my mind and still brings a smile to my face: “Your voice is really weird, but hey, it sounds good anyway, and I like it!” Perhaps Sven-David was right about my voice—it doesn’t appeal to everyone, but to some, it surely does. I feel deeply connected to this piece of music. Although Sven-David never got to hear it performed, his widow, Anne-Marie, once said he would have loved our version had he been around. That thought comforts me, as do the music and the lyrics chosen by Jakob Holtze—Shakespeare, Lorca, Nietzsche, and Sandström. What an extraordinary combination.My next step was to contact Christian Kuhnt, the intendant of the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, to gauge his interest in presenting the project. He was indeed interested. I then approached Östersjöfestivalen at Berwaldhallen in Stockholm, and the head of the concert hall, Staffan Becker, suggested we collaborate with the world-famous Swedish Radio Choir, who had a long and fruitful history with Sven-David Sandström. The ball was rolling. Then the pandemic hit, and everything came to an abrupt stop.
Years later, I was approached by the Swedish Radio. Would I consider taking up Sonnets again, with two performances in Berwaldhallen featuring the Radio Choir? I certainly would. This marked the start of a wonderful collaboration with the choir and the Latvian conductor Kaspars Putniņš. Both performances sold out and Swedish Radio P2 recorded them. What you hear on this album is live!Nils Landgren, Skillinge, January 2025
CreditsRecorded live on March 15–16, 2024, at Berwaldhallen in Stockholm, Sweden
Recording Producer: Jens Braun
Sound engineer: Johan Hyttnäs
Mixing Engineer: Jens Braun
Mastering: Jens Braun
FOH and sound adviser: Jan Ugand
Cover art by Mark Harrington
Nils Kugelmann - Life ScoreCD / Vinyl / digitalNils Kugelmann double bassLuca Zambito pianoSebastian Wolfgruber drumsNils Kugelmann likes telling stories. That much is clear from the titles of his compositions...from the way he talks when he introduces them at concerts...and – naturally – from the music itself. ‘For me, making the connection between music and stories, feelings and situations is so important,’ says the bassist/ composer/ bandleader, now based in Berlin. ‘At concerts I consciously talk to the audience and go into the background of each piece in some detail. It’s something I enjoy. I can hardly imagine presenting music on stage without having this kind of communication.’ Above all, however, the music which Nils Kugelmann plays and composes has real urgency, strong energy and hypnotic power. As an artist he has broken through in a way that no other double bassist of the under-30 generation in Germany has done, in particular his way of making his instrument the central feature of his music. Immediately after completing his master's degree in 2022, Kugelmann launched his debut album ‘Stormy Beauty’ on ACT. German media called him a ‘bass berserker’ and a ‘mega-talent.’ Awards, sold-out concerts duly followed. Kugelmann has a core trio, but beyond that he is free to play in the contexts and styles he likes – first and foremost in a duo and quartet with pianist and composer Shuteen Erdenebaatar.There are so many dimensions to Kugelmann’s musical personality, something which the trio he leads with pianist Luca Zambito and drummer Sebastian Wolfgruber gives him the freedom to express. ‘Life Score’ is in many ways a further development and concentration of the qualities of the band and its leader. ‘Our first album was still from the Corona period. We hardly had a chance to play live and the studio recordings were the first real opportunity to try out the pieces,’ Kugelmann recalls. ‘With ”Life Score’ it's completely different. We have now played a lot of concerts and as a trio we have grown together and got closer. The pieces seem much more compact and concrete.’ ACT CEO and producer Andreas Brandis has played a significant role in this. The trio did try-outs of the new repertoire written by Nils Kugelmann over the course of several live concerts. This was followed by intensive, collective discussions about the selection of pieces, arrangements, sound and dynamics. This meant that the trio was able to go into the studio perfectly prepared and, together with their producer, concentrate on the finer details and find the ideal versions of the pieces for the album. Andreas Brandis says: ‘Nils Kugelmann is not only an incredible bassist, but above all a great songwriter. And precisely because his music is so concise and catchy, it was important to reduce the pieces to their essence.’ All the compositions on the album have a cinematic quality, they are like short films about the lives of their protagonists. These ‘life scores’ draw inspiration from experiences on tour, such as a visit to the Galapagos Islands, but also from moods inspired by balmy summer evenings, the scent of the night, or the incomparable experience of love. These stories are there compositions, in clear, present melodies, in the groovy, flowing rhythm of a homogenous-sounding trio and also in the naturalness of melodic music. Because Nils Kugelmann not only wants to tell stories. He also wants to be heard and understood – by a broad audience and also by listeners of his own generation. ‘Life Score’ is a complex and captivating blueprint, showing us a new kind of film-like Gen Z jazz.CreditsRecorded by Klaus Scheuermann, on September 24–25, 2024, at Soundfabrik in Berlin, Germany Mixed and mastered by Klaus ScheuermannCover art by Bernd Zimmer, “Cosmos”, 2003
ALBUM NOTES BY MALAKOFF KOWALSKI On the day of a piano recording, everything begins with the tuning. The pianist’s preferences, the demands of the repertoire, and the piano technician’s approach must all be brought into harmony. Once the instrument is ready to be played, the adrenaline begins to kick in. We had scheduled a recording session for my album SONGS WITH WORDS. I had already recorded a few pieces with Igor Levit and Chilly Gonzales. Now, Johanna Summer arrived at my studio early in the morning. As she tried the piano after it had been tuned, I heard something entirely new to my ears: jazz! No one had ever played jazz on my upright piano before—a Krauss from the 1920s. The piano had been prepared with felt between the hammers and strings to create an unusually warm, muted sound—somewhere between a Fender Rhodes and a Celesta. Old-fashioned, yet distinctly modern. As I stood there, hoping Johanna would like the feel of the instrument, I realized her sound check was actually something entirely different: a fully formed solo voice demanding to be recorded. We talked, and decided to return a few weeks later and dedicate a full day to capturing whatever music came to Johanna’s mind on this particular piano. The nature of the instrument—especially with the felt—naturally lends itself to a lyrical, introspective expression; at the same time, passages that are overly fast or too loud are barely playable due to mechanical limitations. Johanna usually plays modern grand pianos without bounds, unleashing unbridled improvisations on classical repertoire. Placing her under certain restrictions seemed like an exciting prospect—for her as a pianist and for me as a producer. We expected two or three pieces to emerge, hoping they might eventually develop into a larger work. Finishing seven complete pieces from scratch on a single day felt almost unbelievable. By the very next morning, as we listened back, it was clear this music formed a cohesive cycle: it opens with two original improvisations. If one were to quietly claim that these pieces were composed rather than improvised, it would speak to a level of craftsmanship rarely encountered in contemporary music. GIANT STEPS, STELLA BY STARLIGHT, and I REMEMBER YOU form the heart of the album’s jazz standards. These interpretations—each recorded in multiple takes—achieve something extraordinary. To my knowledge, these pieces have never been approached this way, certainly not on a century-old, felt-prepared upright piano. The free-form introductions might faintly echo Mompou or Bartók—but unmistakably, within just a few notes, one recognizes Johanna Summer’s genuine touch. The standards are distilled to their most essential thematic elements, and Johanns’s brief solos dissolve as subtly as they emerge. Seemingly out of nowhere, TEARDROP by Massive Attack was an idea born in the moment, and one of those rare gifts you can’t plan for at a studio session. The final piece is Wagner’s elusive, dissonant ELEGY IN A FLAT MAJOR—likely a discarded theme from TRISTAN & ISOLDE, long considered one of his last surviving fragments.
The whole experience took us by surprise. It felt like something that happened TO us, rather than something WE initiated. A process entirely out of time. A meeting of freedom and limitation, spontaneity and intention.
Music that’s hard to name—and that is now titled: UPRIGHT.
Emma Rawicz & Gwilym Simcock - Big VisitCD / Vinyl / digitalEmma Rawicz tenor & soprano saxophoneGwilym Simcock pianoThe duo setting can be like a breath of fresh air, particularly for musicians who normally deal with the complexity and intricacy of much larger ventures. Saxophonist Emma Rawicz, whose star has been rising all over Europe since she joined the ACT label last year, runs and directs her own big band. Pianist Gwilym Simcock, whose ACT album “Good Days At Schloss Elmau” was nominated for the Mercury Prize, and has toured the world with Pat Metheny, will at any one time be working on a whole array of orchestral composition commissions.So, when both these musicians approach this new duo project, they do so in an energised and enthusiastic spirit: “It’s a really joyful experience and a positive environment, says Simcock, who adds: “we just get on so well, her writing is so advanced, her attention to detail extraordinary.” Simcock says he not only appreciates Emma Rawicz’s technical mastery of the instrument, particularly her ease in the upper registers, there are musical consequences too: “With her, the ideas just flow from person to instrument, and that’s the ideal we all aspire to.”The respect is mutual. “I was already a fan,” remembers Emma Rawicz, “so playing in a duo really is a dream come true for me.” Despite coming from different musical generations, there are strong affinities in their musical pasts: Simcock and Rawicz even studied with some of the same teachers at the same institutions.
“That means we have some very similar reference points in our musical make up,” says Rawicz. “Keith Jarrett, Jan Garbarek, Ralph Towner, as well as the whole folk-inflected lineage of British jazz lineage through John Taylor, Kenny Wheeler and Norma Winstone. All of that had a big impact.” And both concur that the act of bringing improvisation into the duo of a melody instrument and piano – a setting with classical music associations – reconnects them with the classical music which runs deep in both of their pasts.The original opportunity for the two to meet properly for the first time came at a concert in February 2023 at the Royal Academy of Music, a belated celebration of Simcock’s 40th birthday, for which he had been commissioned to write new music. Rawicz’s memories are of first being excited that she had been picked to play on such a special project, but then of being mesmerized by Gwilym’s astonishing directive energy and eye for detail. Later they talked, both liked the idea of a duo, which was also being actively encouraged by ACT boss Andreas Brandis. The duo brings out commitment, enjoyment and a sense of forward momentum for both of them. “It’s special when we meet,” says Simcock. “We have met up as often as possible, and the duo has evolved every time we got together,” Rawicz enthuses.The critics have loved their early performances. “Rawicz and Simcock excelled, both in the calmer pieces and their more energetic forays. Their communication and conversational interaction were superb,” wrote Polish writer Krzysztof Komorek of their first concert in London. For Deutschlandfunk Kultur, their Jazz Baltica appearance was an undoubted highlight of the 2024 festival.The album was recorded in the quietly idyllic surroundings of Curtis Schwarz’s studio in the West Sussex countryside in Southern England – and on the Steinway “D” which Simcock originally selected for the studio. The mood at the sessions was “relaxed, easy,” Simcock remembers. They had the freedom to work throughout long days and to take breaks when they wanted. The result is an album in which they have successfully achieved fascinating contrasts between moods of calm on the one hand, and “going for it big-time” on the other – an approach which they allude to in the album's title, “Big Visit”.The track titles on “Big Visit” often have a playful element. Gwilym Simcock’s “His Great Adventure”, the opening track, is written in dedication to the boldness of the pianist’s young son. Rawicz’s “The Drumbledrone” uses the Devonian word for a bumblebee; it reminds her of a time as a small child, before she had learned to distinguish Devonian – which her grandmother spoke – from standard English. Simcock’s “Optimum Friction” is a reference to the piano riff at the beginning having some “grindy” inner harmonies. There is a more wistful side too: “Shape of a new Sun” is a quote from the novel ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’ by Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Stevie Wonder’s “Visions” has a clever rhythmic twist. The final track, the ballad “You’ve Changed”, Rawicz says, "brings back to me a particularly happy memory of having learnt the tune by ear as a student."
What’s not to like? Emma Rawicz and Gwilym Simcock clearly both enjoy the duo setting. Critics and audiences are loving it. Their repertoire is growing all the time. They have started with a very strong album. It will be fascinating to watch this like-minded duo as it develops.Credits:Produced by Gwilym Simcock, Emma Rawicz
Recorded in the U.K at Curtis Schwartz Studio by Curtis Schwartz on the 29th &30th July 2024
Edited and mixed by Gwilym Simcock
Mastered by Curtis Schwartz
The Art in Music: Cover art by Paul Quick (1936–2023), ACT Art Collection
Stefano Bollani & iiro Rantala - Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic XVCD / Vinyl / digitalStefano Bollani pianoiiro Rantala pianoSome people are naturally, genuinely funny. They make us smile, and sometimes laugh. It might sound simple to do, but it’s a demanding art, and people who can do it this well are to be admired. For musicians operating at the level of Stefano Bollani or Iiro Rantala, humour has nothing to do with getting cheap laughs through failing, it is rather about how they spring sudden surprises on us – and on each other – by showing us something incongruous or wacky in the music. We’re never laughing at them, always with them. They might be showing us a new perspective, a clever detail that has hardly been spotted before, illuminating some unexpected connection or angle. Out of nowhere, an aria might suddenly be accessorized with a stride piano accompaniment, or the pianists might take a motif and transpose it into some way-out key signature, or use their sparkly, fleet-fingered pianism to comment and illuminate a theme. These two musicians venerate the original, but choose to give it to us in a different guise. It might sometimes turn into a game of hide and seek, but these are humourists who respect their sources and make great use of them. For them to do otherwise would not just leave a bad taste, it would also be completely out of character.Humourists like Stefano Bollani from Milan and Iiro Rantala from Helsinki are masters when it comes to appreciating, valuing, and above all loving the music they play. Each of them also, clearly, holds the artistry of the other in high esteem, venerates the melodic invention of the composers they interpret, and is completely alive to all the possibilities which the instrument can offer. These are musicians with a straightforward love of playing, and, since both are virtuosos, a duo concert by them is an experience of shared creative inspiration. Iiro Rantala says he is happy to celebrate Italian music ‘with the best possible duo partner, il Maestro Bollani.’ And the Italian responds: ‘During a musical career, you meet musicians who are different from you. But how much more fun to share the stage with a guy with a very similar musical taste and approach.’These are two artists, then, who visibly and audibly chime well with each other. They met on the stage of the Berlin Philharmonie on 1 February 2023 to celebrate a shared passion. The basic idea might seem a surprise, but the fact is that both of them have a reverence for Italian opera. ‘I'll go so far as to say that some of the best melodies in the world come from Italy, and in this particular case, from Italian opera,’ Iiro Rantala explains. ‘There is nothing better in music than a good, simple and catchy melody. You can't teach that stuff; there is no melody class in any music school. Verdi, Donizetti, Rossini and Puccini had a talent, a gift for melody! And how magnificently they used it!’During the lifetimes of these composers, this way of making music also went hand in hand with having respect for the audience. The opera composers of the 19th century wanted to offer something to listeners. They wanted to tell stories and entertain, sometimes with a message, but always with a feel for the level of enthusiasm and engagement in the hall. Composers who wrote anthemic and catchy tunes could be sure of being played and sung – and also heard. The concept still works today. ‘La Bohème’ and ‘Nabucco’ are fixtures in the programmes of opera houses, even if the plots and libretti might sometimes seem past their sell-by date. These works are full of melodies that have become ingrained in the collective memory of the cultural world, to the extent that all Stefano Bollani and Iiro Rantala have to do is to suggest the first few notes from Musetta’s waltz (from La Bohème) or hum the Prisoner's Chorus (from Nabucco) and the audience in the Philharmonie is already swaying along.Both players bring a finely-tuned sensitivity to this celebration of Italian opera. And both have such long and deep experience as improvisers, it becomes abundantly clear in this recital that they don’t need to question their first instincts. Their shared enjoyment is palpable: the default mode of communication between them is a smile. They are quite clearly having fun, because on the one hand they are playing repertoire from outside jazz, and yet on the other, there is nothing more 'jazz' than borrowing or stealing a good song. It’s a particularly appealing paradox. Through Italian opera, Bollani and Rantala locate each other's funny-bones. The melodies of Italian opera, may be old, they are certainly important to both musicians, but this album also shows how new and how fresh they can be. Credits:Recorded at the Berlin Philharmonie, Germany on 1st February 2023
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Klaus Scheuermann
Cover art by Peter Krüll
Możdżer - Daniellson - Fresco - BeamoCD / Double vinyl / digitalLeszek MożdżerFazioli piano (A = 440 Hz equal temperament)Steinway piano (A = 432 Hz equal temperament)Östlind & Almquist piano (A = 440 Hz decaphonic tuning) Lars Danielsson
Double bass, cello & viola da gamba
Zohar Fresco
Frame drums, percussion & vocalsIn July 2004, when Leszek Możdżer, Lars Danielsson, and Zohar Fresco performed together for the first time in Warsaw, few could have predicted that this trio would evolve into one of jazz’s most enduring and celebrated ensembles. Now, 20 years later, they return with “Beamo” - an album that not only reaffirms their mastery but also opens a bold new chapter in their musical story.At the heart of “Beamo” is an extraordinary experiment in tonality. Leszek Możdżer redefines the conventions established by 17th- and 18th-century masters like Bach and Rameau, breaking free from the equal temperament system, which divides the octave into 12 equal intervals. While this system has dominated music for centuries, Możdżer challenges its limitations, describing it as “a painful pixelation of music, reduced to twelve obligatory tones.” For “Beamo”, Możdżer employs three grand pianos with unique tunings: one at the modern standard of A = 440 Hz, one at A = 432 Hz, and a third in a decaphonic tuning, dividing the octave into 10 equal intervals. This approach doesn’t abandon tonality but reshapes it, creating a tonal instability that is both intriguing and profoundly beautiful.Lars Danielsson masterfully navigates this new soundscape, weaving these distinct tonalities together with the deep, resonant voice of his double bass. His improvisational brilliance is further showcased when he plays the viola da gamba on tracks like “Decaphonesca”, adapting its frets to align with the decaphonic tuning. Meanwhile, Zohar Fresco provides a rhythmic foundation of extraordinary depth and complexity, his percussion work glistening with intricate details that form a world of their own.According to Leszek Możdżer the album title is “a game, a code and it’s up to the listener to decode its’ hidden message... It could be a reference to the Latin word „amo” representing the qualities of love, or a “beam” - symbolizing a ray of light. It’s a riddle, a multidimensional manifesto - and the shortest poem possible.” Each track on “Beamo” is a unique narrative. In “Kurtu”, deliberate detuning creates a sense of emotional tension, while “Ambio Bluette” explores dual tonalities through the interplay of Możdżer’s left and right hands. "Catusella" pays homage to Danielsson’s iconic composition "Asta" on the trio's debut album "The Time", blending two differently tuned pianos in a seamless dialogue.Despite its experimental nature, “Beamo” remains rooted in the trio’s signature style - marked by European lyricism, classical sound quality, and the interplay of virtuosic solos. Yet, there’s an added dimension, an echo of Early Music’s rich and imperfect tones, reminiscent of clavichords and spinets. This synthesis of historical resonance and modern innovation is unparalleled in contemporary jazz. “Beamo” dazzles, surprises, and inspires, offering listeners a sound that feels both mysterious and familiar. It’s more than an album - it’s a transformative musical experience that reimagines what jazz can be.Credits:
Recorded from 18-22.09.2023 at Monochrom Studio (Poland) by Piotr Taraszkiewicz, assisted by Ignacy Gruszecki (Mono-chrom Studio)
Additional cello parts recorded on 12.12. 2023 at Tia Dia Studios, Mölnlycke (Sweden) by Piotr Taraszkiewicz Brim On & Jacob's Ladder were performed in A = 432 Hz equal temperament tuning
Decaphonesca was performed in decaphonic tuning
Enjoy the Silence was performed in 440 Hz tuningAll other pieces were performed with the simultaneous use of two or three mixed tunings (440 Hz, 432 Hz and decaphonic tuning)
Cover Art by Michał Wit Kowalski
Marius Neset - CabaretCD / Vinyl / digital
Marius Neset tenor and soprano saxophonesEWI
Elliot Galvin keyboards
Magnus Hjorth piano
Conor Chaplin electric bass
Anton Eger drums, percussion
Cabaret: a song and dance or two, some jokes, hummable tunes, and perhaps some sparkles - right? OK, but know that this cabaret is informed by a breathtakingly wide-ranging musical imagination. Now you have a better idea what to expect from the latest inspired work from Norwegian saxophonist and composer Marius Neset. The players on the album “Cabaret” are the same as on Neset’s striking 2022 effort, “Happy”: Elliot Galvin (keyboards), Magnus Hjorth (piano), Conor Chaplin (electric bass) and Anton Eger (drums & percussion). “Happy” was the first time they played together as a quintet, lending it a freshness in discovery. Now, though, they are a seasoned working band: “we’ve played a lot of concerts, and the interplay is different”, recapitulates Marius Neset. After recent releases featuring Neset’s widescreen large ensemble writing for the London Sinfonietta including an appearance in the programme of BBC Proms at Royal Albert Hall, a solo saxophone record, and a through-written duo suite with classical piano star Leif Ove Andsnes, a new project with the quintet was “a bit like coming home again”, says Marius Neset. But not do the same thing again. “The whole thing is about developing the music”. The five reconvened in the celebrated coastal retreat of Norway’s Ocean Sound Studio, which Marius Neset used for 2015’s ‘Pinball’, to tackle music in which “every single note was composed for these specific musicians”. That again exploits the sound of two keyboards. Neset thinks orchestrally, and the combination of Magnus Hjorth on acoustic piano - mainly focussing on melody - and Elliot Galvin’s texturally varied electric keyboards offers “enormous possibilities” for the composer. The new pieces also expand the envelope rhythmically, posing challenges for bassist Conor Chaplin and Anton Eger on drums - “the most dedicated musician I’ve ever met” - who puts enough closely targeted energy into the music to light a small town. A clue lies in the mysteriously titled ‘Hyp3rsonic Cabar3t’, the first piece here Neset wrote. The numerals signify the 33 beat rhythmic cycle that animates it, to mesmeric effect. Five other songs use the same figure, in very different ways. The listener may not realise, says Neset, but “it’s the most conceptual album I’ve ever made”. All this made for a memorable time in the studio. “Putting something like this together means making lots of choices the whole time. It’s hard. I’m getting better at throwing things out, but I don’t feel I understand more - it was very intense!” That effort comes out in the best possible way. Neset’s music is often dense and intricate, but needs players who can tackle it like him, with a kind of focussed abandon. And there’s plenty of that here. The listener is on a roller-coaster ride, following songs that are rich in contrasts, torrential melodic invention, and shifting dynamics. Many influences are mixed in, notably hints of Joe Zawinul’s melodic and textural signatures, and traces of one-time mentor Django Bates’ puckish humour. But the whole record, from the virtuosic sax playing on tenor and soprano - where a technique the equal of Michael Brecker meets a melodic sense to rival that of any horn player alive - to the compositional detail, is pure Neset. There is so much packed in here. The madcap dance of the two opening titles is offset by the cool lyricism of ‘Song for Maja’, the effervescence of ‘Midsummer Beats’ succeeded by the stately voyage of ‘Ocean’, the energy of ‘Quantum Dance’ by the wistfulness of ‘Forgotten Ballet’, while ‘Wedding In Geiranger’, written to mark Neset’s own betrothal last summer, ends the set with a theme like a freshly minted folk song. It’s an eventful and dramatic journey, after which the listener will surely want to begin again.Credits:Produced by Marius Neset & Anton Eger
All music composed and arranged by Marius Neset, except #4 and #9 – composed by Marius Neset & Anton Eger
Recorded by Henning Svoren at Ocean Sound, Giske in September 2024, mixed by August Wanngren at Virkeligheden, mastered by Sofia von Hage and Thomas Eberger at Stockholm Mastering
Andreas Schaerer - Anthem For No Man´s LandCD / Vinyl / digital
Andreas Schaerer voice, mouth percussion, bass-synth
Luciano Biondini accordion
Kalle Kalima electric guitar
Lucas Niggli drums
Swiss vocal phenomenon Andreas Schaerer has been described as 'the Germanic Bobby McFerrin with the flow of a Shakespearean actor’ (L’Alsace). His ‘charismatic and powerful stage presence’ (FAZ) mark him out as a unique figure in European music, a distinction recognised in early 2024 when he became the French Académie du Jazz’s European Artist of the Year. Schaerer, as a musical creator intent on making original art – arguably even a completely original art form – is highly conscious of the processes by which the charisma and the presence of a vocal soloist function. As he says, ‘a voice always comes directly out of the music around it. In “Anthem For No Mans Land" he takes a further step in demonstrating that he is driven by other motivations than simply to shine as soloist. Deeply committed to the collective ethos of his regular quartet, he says: ‘I have consciously studied how I can use my voice to accompany music or an instrument. It's less difficult to find accompanying patterns than to ensure that the voice doesn't constantly push itself to the fore. If you don't want to take on this traditional role as a singer, you have to be very deliberate in the shaping of your music.’ What will always shine through, however, and particularly in live performance, is the passion Schaerer applies to his art. On stage, his whole body becomes an instrument, elastic and dance-like. He inhabits the music, glides into it, takes on roles that emerge from the sounds he makes. It's an unusual concept which he can take further when he teams up with drummer Lucas Niggli, guitarist Kalle Kalima and accordionist Luciano Biondini. The quartet brings together strong and disparate musical characters who now know each other well: ‘The band has been in existence since 2016‘ says Schaerer. ‘The original nucleus was the duo with Lucas Niggli which already existed at that time. We couldn't decide whether we wanted to go more in an electronic or an acoustic direction in the long run. The plan was to have two trios. We explored one direction with Kalle and the other with Luciano. The chemistry was right, so a quartet came out of it. And we all play together in other ways, as duos in different combinations.’ It is now more than six years since the release of the quartet's first album, ‘A Novel Of Anomaly’ in 2018, and the band has evolved considerably through more than 100 concerts. The gap between albums is explained by the fact that Schaerer is involved in several other projects: Hildegard lernt fliegen, Out Of Land, The Big Wig, Rom / Schaerer / Eberle or Evolution...All of this other work feeds back into the way the group works. The quartet’s music, as heard on “Anthem For No Man’s Land”, is now perceptibly on a larger scale, and it also has a greater sense of openness and freedom. Along with Andreas Schaerer’s conscious retreat from the ‘front line’ of the band and into the collective, there is also a new experimental freedom in his use of language. The opening sentence of the liner note makes this clear: “This is our musical offering for a utopian, inclusive society, using a new, free, imaginary language unlimited by origin or cultural boundaries.” Schaerer achieves something remarkable here: without renouncing the spoken word, he has also, simultaneously, managed to turn his back on it. The words he sings may sound familiar, but the language here is invented. Schaerer’s way is to evoke associations and to create moods with language. And the way he does it is so masterful and subtle, a casual listener might have the impression they are listening to English, Spanish, Greek or Italian, and that the words have a meaning. In fact, they don’t. And whereas all this might sound as if it is done just as a joke and to get a laugh, it isn’t. There is a serious purpose. As Schaerer says: ‘The interface between language, music and sound is particularly exciting. I have always been interested in playing with this nexus, where content dissolves and language is just sound, but still has enough linguistic DNA to continue to be understood as such. It's fluid, even funny, a childlike place. Children also speak many fantasy languages. And on this album, I thought a lot in this direction. Some pieces work well without any, but others demand a language. I then experimented with imaginary English or Italian, where I only used the ‘temperatures’ of the sounds. Because it quickly became clear to me that “Anthem For No Man’s Land” should use a more free languages that do not belong to any nation. They are all non-existent words.’ The music is completely aligned with this Utopian ideal. As the liner note states: “We are not just striving to affirm freedom, we want to live it in our music.” At times, ‘Anthem For No Man’s Land’ sounds like prog rock or the psychedelic sound of the seventies. At others there is the chance to enjoy echoes of Italian popular song or to lean in to a tango. There are influences of West African rhythms and Alpine melodies. Chamber jazz leads to a sophisticated form of Dada, the diversity of sounds and motifs matches the images conjured up by the imaginary languages. “Anthem For No Mans Land” never just sticks with the obvious. Schaerer and his quartet have declared the intention to express an ideal, a philosophy ‘through the emotions and the immediacy of our music.’ They have succeeded. Credits:
Produced by Andreas Schaerer, Kalle Kalima; Martin Ruch
#1 & 8 composed by Kalle Kalima, lyrics by Andreas Schaerer
#2 composed by Luciano Biondini
#3, 4 & 9 composed by Andreas Schaerer
#5 & 6 composed by Kalle Kalima
#7 composed by Lucas Niggli & Kalle Kalima
#10 composed by Luciano Biondini & Andreas Schaerer, lyrics by A. Schaerer
Recorded by Martin Ruch at Jazzanova Recording Studio in Berlin, May 28-30, 2024.
Mixed & Mastered by Martin Ruch
Assistant Engineer: Marian Hafenstein
The Art in Music: Cover art by Martin Noël (1956-2010), 2010, used by kind permission of Margarete and Cora Noël
Adam Bałdych - PortraitsCD / digital
Adam Bałdych violin, renaissance violin
Sebastian Zawadzki piano, upright piano
Marek Konarski tenor saxophone
Andrzej Święs double bass
Dawid Fortuna drums
There is an urgency and an intensity about Polish violinist/composer Adam Bałdych; both traits run deep in his work. A total commitment to what he does is clear from the music that he makes and the emotions he conveys. But in “Portraits” such imperatives have been strengthened: the music carries astonishing pathos and weightiness of expression, as are natural for an artist reflecting on these troubled times. Bałdych explains: ‘When I was working on the pieces, reports from people who survived the Second World War were a source of inspiration for me. The topic feels very important to me in view of the growing conflicts in Europe and the world. I read eyewitness accounts from that time and I wanted to take a stand against what thousands have to suffer again today. A call for peace in the world. A variety of very emotional pieces has been created, which attempt to portray people and living conditions and the times in which we live. It is about worries, but also about the indescribable beauty of the world which I try to capture in my sounds and in the music’.
There is a spiritual side to this music too. “Portraits” combines lament, prayer, jubilation and exuberance. After all, for an artist to want to contribute to the discussion is only human - even if as an instrumental musician he doesn’t have words at his disposal. And yet speechless is not a word you could ever use to describe Adam Bałdych, quite the opposite. His music opens up a realm of experience that extends beyond the boundaries of the spoken word. He is a virtuoso, educated in Katowice and at Berklee College, with many awards to his name, and also the experience of having played in venues all over the world.
And yet he is also a team player who knows how important it is to let ideas take form, to come to life by first affecting those around him: ‘When I brought the music to the band rehearsal, we first spent a lot of time working out the instrumentation and arrangements. It was a bit like classical music, we listened to the registers of the instruments and looked for the appropriate space for them to really speak at their most powerful. The process was a meticulous, almost surgical. Although we are all improvisers, and each of us wanted to put as much of our individual voice into the music as possible, we also wanted to plan precisely the execution with great precision, as the best way to maintain that freedom and not lose any of our personalities. It was a very inspiring process.’ This creative tension between the inward- and the outward-facing, between personality and community is at the heart of this programme of 15 pieces. Adam Bałdych's violins lead the music, both his normal instrument and his splendidly sonorous Renaissance violin (a unique replica by an Austrian luthier), which opens up lower registers with its woody tones. There is a vigorous and lively energy in his longstanding Polish quintet: ‘We have a very honest relationship with each other, based on an understanding of the culture and tradition we grew up in. And we understand each other intuitively, giving each other the space to develop narratives. It's like a polyphonic composition, made up of many voices, each one letting one fellow player into the foreground, with the others then acting as a counterpoint. Each of us is an independent personality, we respect each other and at the same time we all respect the music as a whole, and develop it together.’ “Portraits” has emerged into life as a force field.
There is a reason why “Portraits” is not just thought-provoking but also uplifting. And that is because the Adam Bałdych Quintet has an incredibly powerful story to tell. Even without the use of words.Credits:
Music produced by Adam Bałdych & Mateusz Banasiuk Music composed by Adam Bałdych, except “Prelude” – composed by Sebastian Zawadzki Recorded between October 15th – 17th, 2023, at Boogie Town Studio, Poland
Sound engineer, mixing and mastering: Mateusz Banasiuk
Jakob Manz & Johanna Summer - CameoCD / Vinyl / digital
Johanna Summer piano
Jakob Manz alto saxophone & recorder The duo of pianist Johanna Summer and saxophonist Jakob Manz is a stroke of luck for the young German jazz scene: the pair are two of its stand-out figures, each blessed with supreme virtuosity, indomitable boldness, broad musical horizons, and an unmistakable individual signature. Their thorough grounding in jazz can be clearly discerned, but at the same time one can hear how they broaden the idiom, welcoming in all kinds of other influences. For Johanna Summer, classical music is particularly prevalent. She regularly performs in major classical music venues, playing free improvisations on everything from Bach to Ligeti, both solo and in a duo with Igor Levit. Jakob Manz’s musical heritage and leanings are very different: his combination of the melodic and rhythmic power of pop with the sensitivity of jazz is totally compelling. He has deep admiration for pop-jazz crossover artists such as Dave Sanborn and Marcus Miller, and through his recent work with German pop star Sarah Connor, the art of projecting his lively sound into huge venues has now become second nature.
Jazz, pop, classical, improvisation, composition...on their second album together, ‘Cameo’, Johanna Summer and Jakob Manz have made the choice to deploy this vast palette of colours in the smallest and most intimate format in which musical interaction can happen, the duo. The repertoire and concept of the new album, produced by Andreas Brandis, mark a step change from their debut together ‘The Gallery Concerts I’. Johanna Summer explains: ‘This time we wanted to write and/or select pieces that not everyone can play, but which suit Jakob and me particularly well. On the first duo album, we played standards and classics, very spontaneously and live. This time, we have tailored the pieces to suit each other.’ The range of original compositions reflects that of their protagonists, from the heartfelt opener ‘The Opposite’ to the rousing ‘The Turmoil’ (with Jakob Manz's virtuoso performance on the recorder) and the soul-drenched ballad ‘The Endless Dream’.In addition to the eight original compositions, there are also three unusual and particularly characterful arrangements: ‘Im Schönsten Wiesengrunde’(in the loveliest meadow) is a folk song from Jakob Manz’s home region of Swabia, a melody which has been in the air around him ever since early childhood. ‘Mahler Neu(n)’ (Mahler new/nine) is based on the 4th movement of Mahler's 9th symphony – a very familiar piece for Johanna Summer. ‘It almost has the feel of a pop song’, she says. The same can be said of Herbert Grönemeyer's ‘Flugzeuge im Bauch’ (aeroplanes in the belly), although interpreting this piece has been quite some challenge. As Jakob Manz recalls: ‘Transferring Grönemeyer's completely uniquely expressive singing to an instrument turned out to be extremely demanding. The song has more of the sense of words being spoken than a classic melody; I tried to extract the essence of the song.’ Manz and Summer have found clever ways to gently and carefully manoeuvre themselves around the original, very edgy theme. The result is that the pair succeed where all too many jazz arrangements of pop songs come to grief: this one adds another dimension and takes the song to a new level. There is true alchemy in what these musicians do, not least because they are both so keen to seek out and discover new music. There is magic in their way of listening and reacting, complete enchantment in how the two protagonists – so different and yet so aligned – complement and surprise each other again and again. ‘Whenever Johanna improvises, something happens that you’re not expecting. When she takes a solo, it often seems as if it's been composed, but in fact it’s different each time, it’s just emerged in the moment. There are very few musicians who have mastered that. It challenges me again and again.’ And Johanna Summer responds: ‘I'm impressed by how endlessly musical Jakob is. Everything he plays is coherent and strong; his playing has a clarity that is very human, musical and relatable. Even when he plays something very complex, it is never an end in itself, but always integrated into something that makes perfect sense and is very clear. It is a clarity that is very human, musical and comprehensible. And I am impressed by how Jakob can deliver to the point and draw out everything from within, regardless of external circumstances. He is always 100% there.’ How and why does the duo of Johanna Summer and Jakob Manz function so well? Rather than trying to investigate the two musicians’ individual backstories or influences, one might just as well admit that their appeal is something which can only be felt rather than explained. For some magical reason, a lot of what happens in the music of Johanna Summer and Jakob Manz finds them in complete accord with each other, even though nothing they play is foreseeable until a split second beforehand.. Jakob Manz says: ‘When I play in a duo with Johanna, many of the habits I have developed in playing with other musicians simply don't work any more. Something new can happen at any moment, so you always have to stay incredibly alert. It's very inspiring!’ This album is a testament to the great alertness and sensitivity of both musicians. The listener cannot fail to notice the particular effervescence and immediacy of their musical dialogue. One can only marvel at how such freedom and such clarity co-exist, at the way in which these two very disparate characters interact with each other with such gentleness and self-assurance. The music they co-create is colourful, lively, and deeply felt. A stroke of luck, indeed, maybe even a miracle.Credits:
Music composed by Johanna Summer & Jakob Manz, except #4 (traditional), #7 (Herbert Grönemeyer) and #9 (Gustav Mahler)
Produced by Andreas Brandis Recorded by Emanuel Uch from July 31 to August 1 at the ACT Gallery in Berlin, Germany Mixed and mastered by Emanuel Uch
Julian & Roman Wasserfuhr - Safe PlaceCD / Vinyl / digitalJulian Wasserfuhr trumpet & flugelhorn
Roman Wasserfuhr piano, bass & drums (#10)
Jörg Brinkmann cello Paul Heller saxophone (#6 & #7)
‘Safe Place’ was originally just one song, but Roman and I soon realised that it needed to be the title of the whole album. That was because it describes so well the feeling and the intention behind the music,’ says trumpeter Julian Wasserfuhr. The album “Safe Place” is a collection of music which gives you a feeling of being thoroughly at home. ‘Home’ here doesn’t mean so much a specific location, but rather an idea of familiarity, warmth, self-reflection. And the album – which also marks 20 years on the ACT label for the brothers Julian and Roman Wasserfuhr – offers an opportunity to reflect on what is essential: clear melodies, atmospheric musical images painted in warm colours, and an interplay between the players which has not just remarkable precision but also ineffable lightness.For the Wasserfuhr brothers, the concept of ‘home’ also represents their connections with people who are significant to them. First and foremost, naturally, they have their own relationship, inseparable in life as in music. But there are also firm musical friendships such as the one with cellist Jörg Brink-mann, with whom they recorded their previous album ‘Relaxin’ in Ireland’. Brinkmann clicked immediately with the ‘smallest form of a band’, as Julian and Roman call their duo. It was the beginning of a long collaboration, and the experiences which they shared, such as a tour of Central America, brought them even closer together. It therefore made sense once again to add the rich colours of the cello, as a means to broaden the possibilities of their combined tonal palette. In addition to cellist Jörg Brinkmann, another guest is added to the trio for two tracks: saxophonist Paul Heller. ‘Paul just has a fascinating way of playing,’ says Roman. ‘Working with him was actually an experiment at first, since our music is more like chamber music and he tends to play in larger ensembles. But especially in combination with Jörg, it was something wonderful.’Even if ‘Safe Place’ is intended to be understood as an abstract idea, this music has also clearly not been immune to events affecting the world in the past few years. ‘Of course that plays a role,’ says Julian Wasserfuhr. ‘The way people treat and communicate with each other has always been very important to us in the past. But it is precisely the current time, with its conflicts and contradictions, that makes us think – about the world, but also about ourselves.’ And so ‘Safe Place’ has become an extremely personal and emotional album. It seems as if the great tragedies and triumphs of the world are reflected for Julian and Roman Wasserfuhr on a small and intimate scale: in the gentle, warm breeze, ‘Vent Chaud’, with which the record begins, in the dreamlike ‘Dodo’, based on the French term ‘faire dodo’ – a lovingly child-like way of saying ‘going to sleep‘. ‘Luzifer’ describes Julian's concern for his ailing cat, while “El Caballo Valiente” tells of the will to live and the courage to face life of a fallen horse. “Solitude”, on the other hand, portrays the isolation and loneliness of the Corona pandemic. Roman says of the only cover on the album, Sting's “Fields of Gold”: ’We've covered Sting's music before. And ‘Fields of Gold’ in particular is just a wonderful song, describing such a beautiful place that it is also a ‘safe place’ for us‘.The last two tracks “Safe Place” and “Perfect Tiny Moment”, once again reflect the album’s essence: ‘Safe Place’ was initially created on the guitar, even though I can't play the guitar at all,’ says Julian. ‘I went to Roman with this initial idea, and he then developed it.‘ The two of them then played the song last year with the WDR Big Band, and then also gave it a try out with Jörg Brinkmann in a small line-up. “To this day, it remains the song from the record that we love to play on stage the most. In other words it's the absolute ”safe place’ for all three of us.’ The minimalist ‘Perfect Tiny Moment’ also expresses exactly that: the one small moment when all seems perfect, when everything simply is – and absolutely feels – just right.
Lars Danielsson - Palmer Edititon II: TrioCD / Vinyl / digital
Lars Danielsson double bass & cello
Verneri Pohjola trumpet
John Parricelli guitar
Commitment, consistency and a strong forward-thinking spirit. These are the core values which connect ACT, one of Europe’s leading labels "in the spirit of jazz", with Château Palmer, one of the most mythical Grands Crus from Bordeaux’s Left Bank. The partnership between them combines their worlds of music, wine and cutting-edge art. The art form with which winemaking shares by far the most attributes must be jazz. Like Château Palmer, jazz has deep roots, and walks a flirtatious line between rigour and innovation. At its heart, jazz implies respecting a tradition while constantly enriching it. Is winemaking an art or a craft? Aesthetes and academics have been debating this question for several millennia. Like art, don’t we recognize a transcendent wine precisely by its power to transport us to the most unexpected places? To move us to exaltation, evoking sensations, images and aromas wholly unconnected with grapes: truffle, violets, silk, velvet, satin… For ten years between 2010 and 2019, the wines of Château Palmer have not only been tasted but also heard. Vintages have been unveiled live from the estate’s barrel room through the notes of great jazzmen of our time: Michel Portal, Yaron Herman, Dan Tepfer & Thomas Enhco, Émile Parisien or the legendary Archie Shepp and his Quartet, to name a few. Each occasion has further reinforced the intuitive rightness of the idea that jazz and the wines of Château Palmer do indeed share a common essence: in the freedom of harmonies, the energy of contrasts and the vitality of rhythm. Edition Palmer, the collaboration between ACT & Château Palmer, kicked off in 2023 with a major release: DUO was an intimate musical conversation between Joachim Kühn and Michael Wollny, two of the unquestioned greats of European jazz piano. The recording received international acclaim: ‘Der Tagesspiegel’, one of Germany's most respected daily newspapers, wrote: "The duo of Michael Wollny and Joachim Kühn is an alchemical miracle. They share a spirit of improvisation that combines introspection and expression, anticipation and perspiration." The leading French publication "Jazz Magazine" praised "a deep connection of extreme sensitivity." Whereas the music for the first Edition Palmer was recorded live at the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the second release has been made at Château Palmer itself. A 'salon' in the château itself was the exclusive recording venue for a line-up of top flight, world class musicians. TRIO features the renowned bassist, cellist and composer Lars Danielsson, together with two greats of jazz from the north: Finnish trumpeter Verneri Pohjola and British guitarist John Parricelli. The listener will savour the genius loci, the tranquillity and intimacy of the recording location. This album not only brings the original idea of the collaboration between ACT & Château Palmer to life in a palpably exciting and entirely apposite way, it has also vividly captured the magic which arises when unique artists come together in a uniquely beautiful and special setting.Credits:
Produced by Andreas Brandis In cooperation with Chateau Palmer
The Art in Music: Cover art by Mark Harrington
Celebrate the extraordinary musical life's work of Joachim Kühn - a unique songbook for piano On the occasion of his 80th birthday, the world-renowned jazz pianist Joachim Kühn is releasing a fascinating songbook that captures the essence of his career.25 original compositions selected by the artist
Born on March 15, 1944 in Leipzig, Kühn has shaped the jazz scene since the 1960s and is considered one of the most outstanding musicians of contemporary jazz. In April, he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit First Class - a recognition of his first-class music and his tireless pursuit of artistic freedom. Kühn, a master of improvisation, has always spoken out against social narrow-mindedness.His decision to become a professional jazz musician was made at the age of 14 and is the cornerstone of his extraordinary career. In this songbook, Kühn presents a careful selection of compositions that reflect his musical journey. From the lively sounds of “More Tuna” to the thoughtful harmonies of “Mein Bruder Rolf”, Joachim Kühn's tribute to his late brother, every note tells of his passion and deep understanding of jazz history. Many photos of the great artist round off the overall picture. Whether you are an experienced pianist or an enthusiastic beginner, this songbook offers you the opportunity to immerse yourself in the sound world of one of the greatest jazz pianists. Be inspired by Joachim Kühn's musical legacy and experience the magic of jazz through his own compositions. Get your copy and celebrate with us a remarkable career full of creativity and emotion!
Al Jarreau & NDR Big Band - EllingtonCD / Vinyl / digital
Al Jarreau
NDR Bigband
Trumpets & Flugelhorns / Thorsten Benkenstein, Ingolf Burkhardt, Nicolas Boysen, Reiner Winterschladen
Saxophones / Fiete Felsch, Björn Berger, Christof Lauer, Frank Delle, Tini Thomsen
Trombones / Dan Gottshall, Günter Bollmann (26 November), Klaus Heidenreich (29 November),Stefan Lottermann, Ingo Lahme
Tuba / Ingo Lahme
Piano, Rhodes / Hans Vroomans
E+A Guitar / Peter Tiehuis
E+A Bass / Christian Diener
Drums / Wolfgang Haffner
Conductor & arranger / Jörg Achim Keller
Vocal arranger / Joe Turano
Al Jarreau always said he sang Al Jarreau music, and he truly was one of a kind: his six Grammy awards and nineteen nominations as ‘Best Vocalist’ cover no fewer than three categories – jazz, pop and R&B – in other words, musical genres didn’t really concern him. “Music may well fall into categories for other people, and I understand that,” he said, “but for me, if I like a song, I have to do it, and that’s that. If you come to my concerts, I sit on your shoulder and whisper in your ear. I open minds and walk through many doors.” This kind of rich, descriptive imagery evokes the flights of vocal fantasy which his singing was capable of at any moment. He could suddenly take a song in a new and unexpected directions. He used to explain it thus: “If there is a backbone to what I do, it’s the jazz vernacular.”Music, sounds and rhythm seemed to flow through him, and no wonder. Born in 1940 into a musical family, he was an above-average student, graduating with a Bachelor Of Science degree in Psychology and subsequently a Master’s Degree in Vocational Rehabilitation. And yet music was never far from him. Joining a trio led by pianist George Duke by the late 1960s, he was working towards making singing a full-time vocation in Los Angeles nightspots such as Dino’s and the Troubadour. It was at this point that Siggi Loch, who back then was a high-flying executive at Warner Brothers Records (WEA), and who later went on to found ACT Records, first heard him. “I saw Al Jarreau for the first time in the Troubadour in Los Angeles in 1974 and was instantly hooked by his voice and his stage presence,” he recalls. “The next day I went to see Mo Ostin, President of Warner Bros. Records, to convince him to sign him.”
After encountering initial resistance, Loch was given the go-ahead and Jarreau’s debut album for WEA, “We Got By”, was released in 1975. “I brought Al over to Germany before he had any success in the U.S.,” continues Loch. “Al performed for three nights at the legendary club “Onkel Pö” in Hamburg and I managed to convince Michael Naura, the head of jazz at NDR, to record the third night for live TV broadcast.” That show made Al famous in Germany overnight, and ever since that moment, he has always had a special place in the hearts of German audiences. In fact, just a few days later, and with the help of his longtime friend and legendary promoter Karsten Jahnke, Al Jarreau sold out the entire present-day Laeiszhalle in Hamburg. “We Got By” won the German Record Critics’ Award and his first German tour sold out large concert halls.
It was followed by “Glow” (1976), which again was well-received in Europe, winning a second German Record Critics’ Award, but did not do so well in the United States, “That was aimed at ‘smooth jazz’ audiences,” said Loch. “It didn’t capture Al in front of a live audience. So I requested that his next release had to be a live album. Mo Ostin reluctantly agreed,” and “Look to the Rainbow” was a huge success in Europe, “When it was released in the US it became Al’s breakthrough album and won him his first Grammy, so it really is right to say that his career took off first of all in Germany!” says Loch. Jarreau’s long association with NDR prompted Jörg Achim Keller, the former chief conductor of the NDR Bigband (The Hamburg Radio Jazz Orchestra), to suggest a collaboration with the singer in 2016. “Doing a production with Al and Ellington’s music was something I had wanted to do since the early 2000’s,” he remembers. “Al’s reaction was very positive from the start.” Jörg prepared a list of some hundred Ellington titles and, as Jarreau later recalled, “We just went down the list, and it was a case of, ‘Oh, that one works for me,’ and ‘Let’s do this one as an old gut-bucket blues’ – what was important for me was to find myself inside the music and maybe make a different kind of statement about Ellington so people could hear the music in a different way from anything they had heard before.” In writing the charts, Jörg was careful to respect Jarreau’s approach to the material by giving him space. Tracks such as ‘I’m Beginning to See the Light’ or ‘I Got It Bad (and that Ain’t Good)’ also give the band’s soloists headroom to give of their very best. “These are highly evolved, intelligent soloists who can play with anybody in the world,” said Jarreau. “They’re pushing me, and I love the push, and they’re making me sound like a real singer!” At the initiative and promotion of Karsten Jahnke Konzertdirektion, Al Jarreau and the NDR Bigband embarked on their third European tour together in 2016. “There was still some fine-tuning going on during the tour, from concert to concert,” Jörg added with a smile. “He loved doing those ballads – and each one had a different feel. ‘Come Sunday’ was very important to him, though. That chart was reworked twice before he was finally happy with it! On some songs, he went for a pure ballad style – ‘I Got It Bad (and that Ain’t Good)’, some tunes were put into a pop/R&B-bag (‘Lush Life’, ‘Come Sunday’) and he loved that ‘old gut-bucket blues’ feel of ‘I Ain’t Got Nothing but the Blues’.” Reflecting on the recording sessions and tour in 2024, Jörg says, “It was Al’s style and personality that held it all together. The whole thing was a true combination of Jarreau’s and Ellington’s musical mastery – it appealed to audiences all over Europe, they loved the programme.” This feeling is echoed by Siggi Loch, who caught Jarreau with the NDR Bigband in Paris, “It was obvious that he really enjoyed performing this music and he did it with so much energy and emotion, it was a joy to see and hear. Sadly, Al was to pass away only a few months later.” In many ways, “Ellington” closes a circle: it feels very right that Jarreau’s final album should be released on ACT, the label founded by Siggi Loch whose strong and unwavering advocacy for the singer originally set him on the road to superstardom. And the fact that it was recorded by broadcaster NDR and their in-house big band is a fitting reminder that this was the very broadcaster whose TV programme had once made Jarreau famous in Germany overnight. Furthermore, just like “Look to the Rainbow” which was Jarreau’s international breakthrough album, “Ellington” was also recorded live, produced by Karsten Jahnke, whose enthusiastic support and promotion of Jarreau dates back to the “Onkel Pö” days through to his passing. Sometimes threads and connections between events which at first appear to be unrelated, but when the result turns out to be not just special and magical, but also meaningful and deeply affecting, as if it was meant to be. It certainly seems so here. Stuart Nicholson, music journalist Credits:
Executive Producers NDR: Axel Dürr, Stefan Gerdes, Michael Dreyer
Recorded during the European tour, Karsten Jahnke JazzNights, 31 October – 01 December 2016
Recorded at Paradiso in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on 26 November 2016 and at the Opéra Garnier in Monte Carlo, Monaco, on 29 November 2016
Recorded by Stephan Leppkes and Jens Kunze Recording Producer NDR: Oliver Bergner Mixed by Oliver Bergner, Sven Kohlwage and Marc Schettler
Mastered by Klaus Scheuermann
The famous compliation "Magic Moments", curated by Siggi LochTracklist:
01 Elevation of Love // Album: e.s.t. 30
Magnus Öström, Dan Berglund, Magnus Lindgren, Joel Lyssarides, Verneri Pohjola, Ulf Wakenius 02 Second Nature // Album: Life Rhythm
Wolfgang Haffner03 Raw // Album: raw
Nils Landgren Funk Unit 04 The Answer // Album: The Answer
Jakob Manz 05 Shots // Album: Bloom
Bill Laurance 06 Das Handtuch // Album: Tough Stuff
Iiro Rantala 07 She’ll Arrive Between 10 & 11 // Album: Guitar PoetryMikael Máni 08 Terrible Seeds // Album: While You Wait
Little North 09 Se Telefonando // Album: Ennio
Grégoire Maret, Romain Collin 10 Wonderland // Album: Wonderland
Daniel García Trio 11 Fresu // Album: Inner Spirits
Jan Lundgren, Yamandu Costa 12 Hands Off // Album: Stealing Moments
Viktoria Tolstoy 13 Hidden Prelude // Album: What the Fugue
Florian Willeitner 14 Pralin // Album: Let Them Cook
Emile Parisien 15 My Brother Rolf // Album: Komeda
Joachim Kühn 16 Passacaglia // Album: Passacaglia
Adam Bałdych, Leszek Możdżer 17 Linden Tree Rag // Album: Rag Bag
Bernd Lhotzky 18 Zafeirious Solo // Album: Arcs & Rivers
Joel Lyssarides, Georgios Prokopiou
Nesrine - Kan Ya MakanCD / Vinyl / digital
Nesrine vocals, cello
Vincent Huma guitar
Grégoire Musso bass, keyboards
Anissa Nehari percussion
Rhani Krija percussion
Paco Soler trombone
Franco-Algerian singer, cellist and songwriter Nesrine is a storyteller, a ‘Scheherazade’, for our times. And her album ‘Kan Ya Makan’ – the Arabic for ‘once upon a time’ – has something of the aura of a modern ‘Tales from the Arabian Nights’. The Times newspaper (UK) has called Nesrine ‘an incandescent, multilingual talent’, Rolling Stone Magazine is fascinated by her ‘musical world without borders’. Her songs in Arabic, French and English have the character of a personal biography, encompassing both Algeria, the country in which her family originated, and her current home town, Paris.Nesrine's ingeniously crafted and multifaceted songs are also a reflection of quite how diverse her musical career has been: she played as a classical cellist in Daniel Barenboim's East-Western Divan Orchestra and in the orchestra of the Valencia Opera under conductors including Lorin Maazel – but has also performed as a guest star with Cirque du Soleil. She gave up the safe path of being a classical orchestral musician in favour of a solo career – and has made a major success of the shift: she now regularly performs at Philharmonies, other concert halls and at festivals throughout Europe and the USA, and her two albums on ACT have received international acclaim. A digital EP was also released at the beginning of 2024, featuring Nesrine performing her music with the renowned Metropol Orkest.Whereas Nesrine's previous albums, ‘Ahlam’ with the trio NES (2018) and her solo debut ‘Nesrine’ (2020) took a broader perspective, ‘Kan Ya Makan’ now zooms in close: “My previous albums were more about my view of the world,” says Nesrine. “This one is about my personal story. Many of the pieces are about close relationships between me and other people. But also about me. In ”Dunia’ – the Arabic for ‘life’ – I tell my whole life story, from childhood to the present day.’ And what is abundantly clear is how close and how unified the very disparate musical and personal influences on Nesrine have now become. For the first time, she also sings in two different languages, Arabic and French, within the same song. She says: ‘I firmly believe in this kind of connection and the possibilities it opens up. It's a real reflection of myself and a liberation. I don't have to choose one side; I can just be both.’This reconciliation of apparent contradictions is also reflected in the music. For example, the cello part in the song ‘Bonnie & Clyde’, quotes the prelude from the Cello Suite No. 1 by Johann Sebastian Bach, while elsewhere there are references to Serge Gainsbourg combined with Arabic rhythms; stylistically confident and vocal passages with some judicious vocal processing are blended in to the complexity of layered cello patterns. Nesrine uses the classical heritage of her instrument in a wide variety of ways, creating bass lines, pads, arpeggios, melody lines – and layering them into elaborate structures of complex clarity. ‘The cello is my constant companion,’ explains Nesrine. ‘It usually forms the starting point when I’m composing; everything else builds on it. Only sometimes do I have a vocal melody in my head, and only then do I bring in the cello.’Despite the complexity of her music, writing is first and foremost a sensual, intuitive process for Nesrine: ‘It's like capturing information that already exists. I don't write much music. Whatever I write is just there and that's it. For the current album, I only had these nine songs. That's how I always work, my whole working process is very focussed.’ Together with her producers and fellow musicians Vincent Huma and Grégoire Musso, Nesrine has distilled her ideas into compact, three- to four-minute formats. They were joined by friends such as Rhani Krija and Anissa Nehari on percussion, plus trombonist Paco Soler – and cellist and singer Juliette Saumagne, her female Clyde in the song ‘Bonnie & Clyde’. Even though Nesrine mainly talks about herself, her life and her personal connections to other people and things in the songs on ‘Kan Ya Makan’, the album also conveys her view of the world and our time: "If my grandfather hadn't left Algeria at some point and come to France, I wouldn't be the person I am today, I wouldn't be making the music I make. I want my listeners to feel that it's not primarily a problem when people move from one country to another – it's a beautiful thing. The current political debates are all about extremes. I don't think that will get us anywhere. What gives me confidence and strength are the people who listen to my music and my stories. We only see what we want to see. And I want to open people's eyes with my music." In the title track she sings: Kan Ya Makan....once upon a time: love, art and beauty.
"Nesrine lets us hear the beauty of the world." (André Manoukian, Radio France) Credits:
Produced by Nesrine, Grégoire Musso, Vincent Huma
Joachim Kühn French Trio - The WayCD / Vinyl / digital
Joachim Kühn piano
Thibault Cellier double bass
Sylvain Darrifourcq drums
Each new band in Joachim Kühn's creative career has marked a new departure for him, a broadening of his horizons. Now, in double bassist Thibault Cellier and drummer Sylvain Darrifourcq, the pianist has found two musicians with whom he can achieve the things that are important to him at this stage of his life, around his 80th birthday: to take a path which allows him even more freedom. Joachim Kühn describes playing with these two musicians, much younger than him, as making music "the French way, with lightness, speed and elegance". The three do this intuitively, almost without any need for discussion, but with a real feeling of urgency. The backstory of the formation of the group is a matter of getting straight to the point. Joachim Kühn had been aware of Sylvain Darrifourcq’s playing for some time, notably from his years as the drummer in Émile Parisien's quartet, and also through some experiences of playing together. Kühn’s encounter with Thibault Cellier came about more by chance, in a hotel in Paris, but Joachim already had some familiarity with the bassist’s playing, notably from records by the group Novembre - Sylvain Darrifourcq the bassist plays alongside the bassist in their second album. Contacts were quickly set up, and within four months, the two Frenchmen were in the pianist's home studio in Ibiza, making music and recording as a trio, completely free of constraints. When Joachim Kühn heard the tapes a little later, he said: "That's how I want to sound now.” Or, quite simply, a band had been born. Playing in a piano trio runs right through the pianist's oeuvre. Alongside solo piano, it is and remains the ultimate proving-ground for a pianist. With his first trio, formed in 1964 in his home town of Leipzig, Kühn made his ambition to break new ground very clear. In the years since he moved to Paris at the end of the 1960s, he has frequently worked with French musicians. Formed in 1974 and highly successful for two and a half decades, the trio with bassist Jean-François Jenny-Clark and drummer Daniel Humair demonstrated an innovative and totally interactive style of music that had never been heard before. Joachim Kühn calls the band "the trio of my life". But there were astonishing developments and discoveries after that as well: the trio with Moroccan guembri player Majid Bekkas and Spanish percussionist Ramón López successfully bridged the gap between jazz, European, African and Arabic cultures. And the New Trio with Chris Jennings and Eric Schaefer developed a style of playing with clear contours and a wide-open approach which never failed to fascinate. In some ways, the new French Trio might seem to be a follow-on from the previous trio involving two musicians from the Francophone world, Jean-François Jenny-Clark and Daniel Humair. But history does not repeat itself. And free jazz, in Joachim Kühn’s sense of it, has long since outgrown its infancy. These days, the pianist says, it is just as much about freedom and the spontaneous creation of structures. And also, as with all of the very great role models, especially in their later creative phases – Bach, Coltrane, Ornette Coleman and Joachim's late elder brother Rolf Kühn – it is about finding the way that leads straight to the essential, to the heart of things. And into the open. Credits:
Produced by Joachim Kühn
The Art in Music: Cover Art von Stanley Whitney
Bill Laurance & Michael League - Keeping Company
CD / Vinyl / digital
Bill Laurance piano
Michael League oud, fretless bass, vocals
“For us to take a common project and drive it forwards together is an affirmation of who we are: we're just good friends and we're celebrating that with this album.” Bill Laurance There are some duos which can seem as if they have been patched together. And there are others which come into being naturally and completely of their own accord. The pairing of pianist Bill Laurance and bassist/oud player Michael League is very much one of the latter; the two musicians have known each other since student days. During a chance meeting in Leeds, England, as sidemen on a one-off project, the two quickly formed a musical bond that would grow through the formation of Snarky Puppy in 2004 and its development over years of touring together, a number of solo albums and collaborations, and finally, in 2020, the birth of their duo. Bill Laurance and Michael League’s new duo album, “Keeping Company,” is at the opposite end of the spectrum from all the extraversion, large scale and sheer oomph of Snarky Puppy; the focus here is on a shared inner perspective. That much is apparent immediately from the choice of instruments. Laurance has cast aside electronic keyboards and concentrates on piano, acoustic in sound although the piano strings have been occasionally and lightly prepared. Michael League chooses a fretless acoustic bass guitar and the oud. An extreme contrast to the pure groove of Snarky Puppy, here he goes for a transparently sparse but atmospherically rich sound. They do just fine without the band, creating a special freedom for both participants. “The oud in itself has a specific associative space,” says Bill Laurance from the orchestral perspective of the piano. “When I compose, my aim is to transport the listener. That works with the sound of the oud. It's not a guitar, it has something exotic about it. It's a canvas on which you can paint a lot of things. On the first album, we discussed whether Michael should play a fretless nylon string guitar. He tried it out, but it didn't produce the same emotion as the oud. Due to the oud being fretless, it can access a whole new world of expression and created new colours for the duo. That fascinated us.” Their curiosity is undimmed. “Keeping Company” is the duo's second album after the internationally acclaimed “Where You Wish You Were,” released in January 2023. The preparation phase was extremely productive. Both musicians wrote numerous sketches and compositions, with Bill Laurance alone writing up to three ideas a day for weeks on end. Finally, the abundance of new material had to be whittled down. “The first album was more about establishing a sound and exploring the dynamics. Now we want to delve deeper. There's even more personality in the music. We also wanted to try out things we hadn't explored before in this format, a touch of soul jazz, for example. We also made it a priority to record practically everything live, without unnecessary overdubbing. We have found a particular beauty in concentrating on what happens organically without too much extraneous thought or effort. The whole idea of broadening horizons by taking excursions into the unknown is second nature in this partnership. Michael League, for example, has never formally studied the oud in a classical context. He knows the instrument largely from his brother, who studied it while living in Greece in the early 2000s, and is mentored by Ara Dinkjian, one of the world’s most respected masters of the instrument. But he himself has explored the short-necked lute largely from his own perspective (as encouraged to do so by Dinkjian) and therefore ornaments differently, intuitively, and with a unique accent. Bill Laurance, on the other hand, dispenses with the expansive and grand-standing aspects of the piano. He prefers cantabile melodies, rhythmically clever, clear accompaniments, and compact improvisations. The pieces themselves seem like miniatures- hints at ideas rather than final or definitive statements. And that, as a duo still making discoveries, is all that they need to do here. “Keeping Company” is a snapshot of an unusual team, catching moments like a collection of Polaroids in sound. Bill Laurance and Michael League are still in the wonderfully inspiring phase of joint exploration. Everything is open. The music sounds spontaneous and intuitive. It has the power of the personal and builds on a friendship in which shared humour is a part of what happens naturally. Perhaps one day other players will join in. But for the time being, this intimate musical dialogue is the ideal form of artistic conversation for Bill Laurance and Michael League.Credits:
Produced by Bill Laurance, Michael League & Nic Hard
The story of Peter Somuah is a story about travelling. Firstly in the literal sense that his festival appearances have taken him to places as far-flung as Stockholm and Beijing. But there is more: the Ghanaian trumpeter's music has been forged by his unique journey, encompassing both his origins in Accra in Ghana and his adopted home of Rotterdam. This means the story that Somuah tells through his music is his and his alone. And whereas it brings together disparate role models from jazz such as Miles Davis, Freddy Hubbard and Roy Hargrove, he is also deeply embedded in the Ghanaian ‘highlife’ rhythms of the 1960s. Somuah took that broad canvas and gave us an ambitious biographical mosaic in his memorable ACT debut album ‘Letter to the Universe’, a cosmopolitan fusion of his many influences, which led the respected German broadsheet the Süddeutsche Zeitung to note that the disc ‘gave proof of the complexity of jazz as a world language.’With his follow-up album, ‘Highlife’, Peter Somuah, this young man with the world at his feet, has returned to his origins and to his first musical love. He has been playing ‘highlife’, the iconic music from his homeland – which is strongly rumoured to be joining UNESCO’s worldwide Intangible Cultural Heritage register in 2025 – ever since childhood. In his youth he regularly performed four nights a week in the highlife bands. The audience would dance away as he plied and developed his craft. ‘Highlife has fundamentally influenced the way I play the trumpet, the way I listen to music and compose,’ says Somuah. It is also reflected in his very own trumpet sound: the sometimes radiant, sometimes nuanced and brittle tone that he heard as a young man on the records of highlife icons such as ‘ET Mensah’ or ‘The Ramblers’. Now he sees himself as a connector between two worlds which are clearly related: he has one foot in modern jazz, the other in a traditional highlife bar. His band consists of Dutch musicians alongside a Dutch-Surinamese percussionist. ‘My fellow players didn't grow up in Ghana,’ says Somuah. ‘But that doesn't matter at all. Their deep passion for highlife and afrobeat and the feeling they have developed for this music are the most important things.’ The album was recorded in a small backyard studio in Berlin-Neukölln using vintage analogue equipment, which brings the listener directly in touch with the kind of earthy sound typical for the historic highlife recordings of the 50s and 60s. ‘I wanted to bring this very special sound back to life. Its warmth, its grit, its exuberant joy’. Peter then flew to Ghana with the instrumental tracks and visited some of the heroes of the old highlife genre such as Pat Thomas and Gyedu Blay-Ambolley. ‘During my childhood, I used to hear their songs on the radio all the time. Back then, I would never have dreamed that I would one day be sitting in their living rooms to record them for my album.’ The album ‘Highlife” begins with a history lesson. For ‘The Rhythm’, Peter Somuah visited highlife legend Koo-Nimo in Kumasi and encouraged the veteran to talk about the origins of the music. Back when the British colonial rulers employed bands of Ghanaian musicians, and asked them to perform waltz, samba and Western popular music, it was played exclusively in British clubs and casinos for the pleasure of the upper classes – hence the name ‘highlife’. Most locals, on the other hand, were only allowed to admire the music from the outside: ‘Later,’ says Somuah, ‘the musicians brewed their own mixture. They combined Western instruments with older Ghanaian styles such as palm wine music.’ They brought dancing highlife guitar riffs into play, and other offbeat rhythmic patterns too, notably the ubiquitous clave. Peter Somuah is now taking the journey and the alchemical progress of ‘highlife’ further – as he leads the music to completely new shores more than half a century after its golden age. ‘In the meantime, the original highlife had lost it’s popularity, especially with a new generation,’ says Somuah. ‘Many of the young people no longer know it.’ President Kwame Nkrumah had declared highlife the national dance after Ghana's independence, and bands like that of ET Mensah, the ‘King of Highlife’, toured throughout Africa. But in the 1980s, a military coup destroyed Accra's vibrant music scene. The months-long evening curfew led to the closure of all clubs. Most of the musicians went into exile. ‘From here, the music took on completely new influences,’ explains Somuah. ‘Rock, funk and, above all, disco influences were incorporated, studio-produced tracks and keyboards replaced the big orchestras’. Among the Ghanaian exile community in Hamburg arose a new style, which was known as ‘burger highlife’. Somuah himself became involved with this popular highlife style as part of various bands, before following his passion for jazz. The spark came from Miles Davis whom Somuah discovered through a friend. He fell in love with the language of the African-American jazz revolutionary straight away: ‘I jammed in Accra's only jazz club, imitating Miles and later also Freddie Hubbard –but at the same time tried to bring my own style into it.’ The way Somuah brought jazz awakening and tradition together was unheard of. The move to Rotterdam opened many doors for him and his Dutch quintet worldwide. On the other hand, the distance from his home soil now gives Somuah a new perspective on highlife. It's not only the sounds but also the narrative tradition of this music that interests Peter Somuah: ‘Typically, it deals with everyday stories, it tells of love, friendship and family, combined with a certain morality’ The bandleader himself also sings on “Mental Slavery” – following in the footsteps of Fela Kuti, another of Somuah's long-standing idols and sources of ideas. ‘I'm talking about the enduring legacy of the colonial era: many Ghanaians are still mentally enslaved, see themselves as inferior. They don't dare to proudly present themselves and to contribute their skills’. Somuah's ‘Highlife’ album seems like an antidote to this. The new album is a powerful combination of musical freedom and taking the courage to stand up for yourself. For the trumpeter, the two belong together: dancing to the rhythms of his grandparents, while at the same time looking to and being part of – the future of jazz.
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