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

Michael Wollny Trio - Living Ghosts (Live)CD / Double vinyl / digitalMichael Wollny pianoTim Lefebvre double bassEric Schaefer drums‘The Michael Wollny Trio is a reminder that this is the 21st century – and not the 1960s,’ wrote the UK’s Jazzwise magazine as a reflection on the evolution of the jazz piano trio. And yet, in many respects, Wollny’s new album ‘Living Ghosts’ flies in the face of the Zeitgeist: rather than short single tracks, we find four long ‘sets’. It represents the antithesis to a culture based on channel-hopping or of breaking everything down into bite-size fragments. This music flows across any demarcation lines of category, it demands the full attention of listeners, and also rewards them with complete fulfilment to the senses. As ever, Michael Wollny proves that he is the exception to any rule.For pianist Michael Wollny, his trio with bassist Tim Lefebvre and drummer Eric Schaefer is the constant in a musical cosmos which is otherwise undergoing constant change. The three players are united by a musical vocabulary which is more or less inexhaustible, an outstanding sensitivity in their interplay and the ability to create new music of tremendous tension and dynamism in the moment. Since the release of their last studio album, “Ghosts” (2020, co-conceived and co-produced with Andreas Brandis, the Michael Wollny Trio has performed the material from the album at a wide range of venues, from clubs to classical concert halls and major open-air festivals. Sometimes the trio has performed completely acoustically, sometimes working with a combination of electronic and acoustic sounds. Michael Wollny says, ‘concerts have become beautiful séances where the ghosts of the trio’s songbook visit us at their will. On some evenings they appear briefly and vanish after just a few bars. On others, single motifs inside a theme don’t just stretch out, they also weave new stories.’The repertoire of ‘Living Ghosts’ consists not only of pieces by ‘Ghosts’, but spans the Wollny/ Schaefer/Lefebvre trio’s decade of collaboration, going back to the release of ‘Weltentraum’ in 2014. That album was a game-changer for Wollny, it was the final step which took him into bigger venues – it’s also one of those jazz albums often to be found in the record collections or playlists of people who don’t tend to listen to much jazz. The trio's repertoire has continued to evolve through the years because of the regular schedule of live performances that they maintain. Time and again, Wollny, Schaerer and Lefebvre will allow new spaces to open up in the pieces, as they search together for new, previously unheard music. There are often subtle nuances which give the music a completely new direction in mid-flow. The original compositions, therefore, often serve as just a starting point for these new, and collectively formed musical explorations.It follows that the running order of the album ‘Living Ghosts’ is not divided into a conventional series of individual tracks. What we have are four long chapters, and within these substantial narrative arcs are formed out of fragments from compositions which are re-told in different ways. Michael Wollny says: As the pieces gradually shed their ties to specific arrangements, questions such as which key, what mood, and even whether to make a setlist, have been consigned to the past. New repertoire mingles freely with old; at any moment, different doors, connections and reinterpretations can open up. When we begin our concerts now, we never know which fragments of which pieces will emerge or the order in which they might unfold.’The album ‘Living Ghosts’ is the recording of a concert from April 2024 at the ‘Illipse’ in Illingen, Germany. The recording shows three distinctive characters forming a unit in which both empathy and in-the-moment responsiveness are to the fore. Their music is so much more than the sum of its parts, impressively diverse as the individual components are: Michael Wollny has long been considered one of the most important European pianists of his generation, notably for the way he crosses genres. He is someone who ‘can turn any kind of music into an experience that takes your breath away’ (Süddeutsche Zeitung). In his playing, influences from jazz, classical, indie pop, new and early music merge into a distinctive personal style. Wollny has been working with drummer Eric Schaefer for more than 20 years. No one plays the drums like Schaefer: from the softest whisper to the most powerful blast, beyond the instrument's conventions, with an almost childlike playfulness and at the same time the deepest penetration of all possible styles from new music to heavy rock. Wollny and Schaefer are united by a deep familiarity that has grown from thousands of encounters, and at the same time by their ability to surprise and challenge each other again and again. The trio is anchored by American bassist Tim Lefebvre, an icon of the instrument who has played with artists as different as David Bowie, the Tedeschi-Trucks Band, Donny McCaslin and Wayne Krantz.Together, Wollny, Schaefer and Lefebvre have created music that has an exuberant dynamism about it, and in which there is a boundless sense of variety, and episodes of irresistible urgency. ‘Living Ghosts’ is like a fast-flowing river; the only way to experience it is to feel its intensity, to revel in its twists and turns, be carried along and to experience its sudden and unexpected depths.Credits:Recorded live on April 19, 2024, at Illipse, Illingen (Germany) by Saarländischer Rundfunk The recording is used with the kind permission of Saarländischer Rundfunk Mixed and mastered by Klaus Scheuermann Cover art by Sean Scully “Midday Blue 3” © 2020, courtesy of the artist

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

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

Joel Lyssarides - Arcs & RiversCD / Vinyl / digital Joel Lyssarides piano Georgios Prokopiou bouzouki Exactly when and how the long neck lute ‘bouzouki’ first landed in Greece remains a mystery. Its roots go back to the fourth century before Christ. Named after the “Βυζί“, the Greek word for female breast, the current form of the instrument is relatively young and has been all over Athens and the Peloponnese since around 1920. Initially at home in bars, parties and festivals; it certainly played its part in the revival of the ‘rebetiko’, often referred to ‘the Greek blues’ from the 1960s onwards. ‘Back in the early days there was a lot of improvisation, much more than in recent times...’ says Georgios Prokopiou, ‘because from the fifties onwards, the bouzouki was taught. And that's when so many more things about it became tied down and standardised’. Since that time, the metallic sound of the instrument has become almost synonymous with Greek folklore as the accompaniment for songs and dances...notably with composer Mikis Theodorakis, the source of more than a few ear-worms.Until now, the bouzouki has never got out of the starting gates as a jazz instrument. That, however, is about to change, but it needed a detour via Stockholm. ‘The links and connections aren’t obvious’ says pianist Joel Lyssarides, ‘but they stem from my grandfather, a Greek Cypriot, who came to Sweden in the 1940s. I always liked Greek music, but didn't really know it very well. In any case, I have always found the bouzouki fascinating. During the pandemic I bought myself an instrument and started learning it a bit. While browsing the internet I discovered Georgios from a concert on TV in tribute to Theodorakis. So I asked around in Stockholm if anyone knew him, only to discover that he would be playing a concert in a nearby hotel bar just a few days later.’ That happened in the autumn of 2022. Joel Lyssarides went and heard Georgios Prokopiou playing live, spoke to him afterwards, and they arranged to meet for a session. They jammed together, quickly found that they got on well, and in the summer of 2023 got themselves a booking to give their first concert together. ‘It is very unusual for someone to improvise over changes with the bouzouki,’ Joel Lyssarides continues. ‘After all, it is a traditional instrument with a clearly defined role, mostly accompaniment with parallel thirds and sixths. Georgios, however, does much, much more than that. I had no idea how good he really is. His versatility opens many doors musically. We had a lot of fun opening up new possibilities right from the start. And since I had never heard anyone play bouzouki like that before, I knew that I absolutely had to write some music for it’. Lyssarides also told ACT head and producer Andreas Brandis about the idea for the duo, and he was immediately supportive and enthusiastic: ‘ACT's way of thinking is that the term ‘jazz’ primarily stands for a vocabulary that musicians can use to tell their story against their own personal cultural backdrop. It is fascinating that formations keep emerging that never existed before. And the music that Joel Lyssarides and Giorgios Prokopiou create together is, on the one hand, absolutely surprising and new, but at the same time sounds so organic and natural, as if this combination of instruments had existed forever.’ And, of course, it is not just the instruments – piano and bouzouki – which have come together, but also the individual characters and musical histories of each of the duo partners. Joel Lyssarides from Stockholm combines great virtuosity with impressive ease and a strong sense of mood and dynamics. He has performed with artists as diverse as Anne Sofie von Otter, Benny Anderson, Nils Landgren, Viktoria Tolstoy and recently been part of the Esbjörn Svensson tribute "e.s.t. 30". Since its release in 2022, Lyssarides' ACT debut album "Stay Now" has been played an impressive 25 million times on Spotify alone. Georgios Prokopiou, originally from Athens who now makes his home in Stockholm, began playing bouzouki at the age of six and a half, made his concert debut at the age of eight and by the time he was ten was doing music engagements in the bars and “studios” (brothels) of Athens. Since then he has worked in classical contexts as well as in folk and experimental music. In addition to the bouzouki, he also plays the saz or bağlama, plus a range of other stringed instruments. Lyssarides and Prokopiou chose to cast their net as widely as possible for the material in ‘Arcs & Rivers’. After a rehearsal concert at the ACT Art Collection in Berlin – from which one live track, ‘Zafeirious Solo’, was included in the album – the two of them met again at the same location to record the rest with studio equipment in place. ‘For example, we wanted to include quiet parts, miked up close. We also wanted to capture the great sound of the grand piano which was originally selected by Alfred Brendel. Overall, however, there was a lot which was very spontaneous. The whole album was recorded at one session, within four hours, mostly with first takes. I'm usually a perfectionist and spend days reworking and editing music in the studio. This time, however, I wanted it to be as direct and in-the-moment as possible.’ And it has worked. ‘Arcs & Rivers’ is like a sketchbook containing dialogues which – considering it is a first time venture – sets a bar for achievement very high indeed. Both in the new compositions and in the adaptations of traditional material – as in ‘Kamilieriko Road’ – this music has a dazzling, magical sound. And the duo itself radiates a naturalness of cultural fusion that transcends any stylistic constraints. It seems that indeed the time is right for more bouzouki in jazz, and for its unique sound to be heard by the international music world. Credits: Produced by Joel Lyssarides, Georgios Prokopiou and Andreas Brandis Recorded by Thomas Schöttl at the ACT Gallery in Berlin, Germany, on 29 - 30 April 2024 Mixed and mastered by Klaus Scheuermann The Art in Music: Cover art „Landschaft 1994“ (Detail) created by Manfred Bockelmann

Wolfgang Haffner - Life RhythmCD / Vinyl / digital Wolfgang Haffner drums Simon Oslender piano & keyboards Thomas Stieger bass, sitar guitar (#07) Sebastian Studnitzky trumpet Arto Mäkelä guitar Nils Landgren trombone (#01) Thomas Konstantinou oud (#05) Shantel additional production, electronics & mix (#05) Dominic Miller acoustic guitar (#06) Bruno Müller rhythm guitar (#06) Nicolas Fiszman bass (#06) Bill Evans soprano saxophone (#08) ‘I keep thinking about how to lead a band from the drums in a way that gives the instrument a central role, but one which is more about shaping the music than displaying virtuosity,’ says Wolfgang Haffner. This way of working, a common thread throughout his career, is a key factor in ‘Life Rhythm’, his tenth album for ACT. Haffner may shun the virtuoso drummer/bandleader stereotype – and do so intentionally – but ‘Life Rhythm’ nonetheless has the drums at its very heart. Back in 2022, it was Wolfgang Haffner's very first solo concert at Schloss Elmau in the Bavarian Alps which set the process in motion that has led to this album. He remembers: ‘That was an insane challenge. I had a decision to make: was I really going to play a drum solo … for a full hour? Of course not! So what I did was to add a lot of percussion instruments that I could use melodically, looped passages played live, I worked with reverb and delays – basically it was as if I was in the studio, but on stage.’ This has led to Haffner taking the drum kit, the instrument which has been his close companion throughout his life… and re-thinking his relationship with it: whereas Haffner’s tunes normally originate from the piano, all of the tracks on ‘Life Rhythm’ have the drums as their source.The consequences of this approach can be experienced right from the start of ‘Life Rhythm’: the title track has a driving groove in which drums rather than cymbals set the pulse. It is no coincidence that this groove has a clear echo of Phil Collins and his track ‘Take Me Home’. Collins, and the way he turns a drum part into a building block for his songwriting has always been one of Haffner's greatest inspirations. Each of the eleven highly concentrated, song-like pieces on ‘Life Rhythm’ opens up its own world of particularly musical drumming: ‘Balance’ has some gentle brushwork, in ‘Joy of Life’ it is a cymbal groove, for ‘Eternity’ there is the subtle use of electronics, and in ‘Silence and Sound’ less is definitely more. There is a reason why Haffner is able to transform this wide range of styles into a coherent whole, and that is because of quite how much of his career has been spent playing directly alongside the shapers of the music, Al Jarreau, Chaka Khan, Pat Metheny, Jan Garbarek, Esbjörn Svensson, Albert Mangelsdorff...and many, many more. All of these collaborations have shaped Wolfgang Haffner's vocabulary on the instrument and his personality and individuality as a composer.A versatile approach and the highest level of musicianship are also factors which Wolfgang Haffner has in common with his fellow musicians on ‘Life Rhythm’. At the core is his regular, completely ‘played-in’ trio with keyboard player Simon Oslender, also a drummer and a band leader in his own right, and Thomas Stieger, one of the most sought-after bassists on the German pop and jazz scenes. They are joined by trumpeter Sebastian Studnitzky, Haffner's regular collaborator since his ACT debut ‘Shapes’, and Finnish guitarist Arto Mikälä, a real discovery with remarkable variety in his sound.Haffner also welcomes some unique musical personalities to bring their own highly individual colours to the band: Nils Landgren has been a good friend and touring colleague for more than 20 years. Also appearing are saxophone icon Bill Evans, Sting’s guitarist Dominic Miller, Balkan beat star Shantel, the refined bassist Nicolas Fiszman, oud virtuoso Thomas Konstantinou and Bruno Müller, one of the finest of German jazz guitarists. ‘Life Rhythm’, says Wolfgang Haffner, ‘is not a repetition for me, but a continuation.’ With its warmth, power and clarity, the music has the distinctive hallmark which makes Haffner probably the most popular drummer/bandleader in Europe, known from his albums and from thousands of concerts in more than 100 countries. And at the same time it marks an evolution in his music. Indeed, perhaps one of the key factors behind Haffner's success is that his music will always contain elements of the familiar alongside the new, and that Haffner always brings the audience along with him to participate in the flow of his ideas – and also in the ‘life rhythm’ which he communicates so brilliantly, and instils in everyone around him. Credits: All music composed, produced and arranged by Wolfgang Haffner Cover art created by Peter Krüll

Nils Landgren Funk Unit - rawCD / Vinyl / digital Nils Landgren trombone, vocals Magnum Coltrane Price bass, vocals Andy Pfeiler guitar, vocals Jonas Wall tenor saxophone, bg vocals Petter Bergander keyboards, bg vocals Robert Ikiz drums, bg vocals The year 1994 marks the birth of the Funk Unit. When I got the offer from Siggi Loch to join his new label ACT, the first thing he did was to change the original band name Unit to Funk Unit. When I asked why, he answered: ”because you play funk” – and right he was. The rest is history. After 30 years of albums, touring and everything connected to it, I thought it would be great to go somewhere special for our 30th anniversary recording session. I happen to have a dear friend, Johan Lundgren, who used to be my trombone student lightyears ago, and he, together with another friend, Fredrik Thomander, built a fantastic Recording Studio in Palma on the island of Mallorca. Wouldn’t it be a great opportunity for us all, after all these years together, to record the album in a relaxed setting, being able to fully concentrate on our task? To make an album celebrating our 30-year history as a funk band from Sweden. I presented the idea to my fellow band members, and they all loved it. So did Andreas Brandis, head of the ACT label, my musical home where all my albums have been released since 1994 – twelve of them with Funk Unit, this one included. So now all I had to do was to book the flights, the studio, find accommodation for us all and figure out a way to finance the stay. Oh, there was one more little thing. We all had to write songs for the album. As we met for rehearsals before leaving for the island of Mallorca, no one knew what was written and by whom. I had worked hard in my spare time though, coming in with five songs. So anyway, we started from scratch, listening to each others’ demos and then went on making them sound like us. All of us contributed and it was really great to hear our own compositions come to life. On landing in Palma on my birthday February 15th at 2 pm, we went straight to the studio to set up and get the sound ready for the recordings to start. We just could not wait. Much of the setup had already been done by the studio crew and a few devoted volunteers and sooner than anyone thought possible, we could start to record, with the amazing sound engineer Shades leading the whole operation. From that moment on, we all knew that this was going to be a special album. Everything fell into place. The vibe in the studio, the sound, how the guys in the band played, the food being served in the breaks, how the coffee on the rooftop tasted and the generous dinners after finishing up for the day. To finance the recordings, we had decided to give in-house concerts the last two evenings after recording. Although it meant even longer days for everyone, it was a wonderful feeling to get the chance to test some of the music we had recorded in front of a live audience sitting almost in our laps. It was so rewarding to get feedback from the people that came to our shows. On top of that, we had a film team lead by our dear friend Dan Sermand documenting the whole thing. We all left the island February 20th with a sense of deep satisfaction, knowing that we had done our very best and that our best might be more than just good enough. Only one man stayed behind in Palma: Magnum. Aside from being a badass bass player and singer, he is also the one person at my side, who has experienced the whole Funk Unit journey from Live in Stockholm till today. We had decided to mix the album in the same studio and Shades was not available until a week later. I believe Magnum had a good time, both hangin’ and working with master Shades. The result is this album Raw. Our honest and simple way to create handmade music and to make it enjoyable for both body and soul. We are not just a band. We are Nils Landgren Funk Unit.

Magnus Öström - e.s.t. 30CD / Vinyl / digital Magnus Öström drums Dan Berglund double bass Magnus Lindgren tenor saxophone, flute Joel Lyssarides piano Verneri Pohjola trumpet Ulf Wakenius electric guitar Love remains... In 1993, three musicians from Sweden, Esbjörn Svensson, Dan Berglund and Magnus Öström formed the band e.s.t.. Svensson and Öström had known each other ever since their first steps into music as children. Neither of them could have anticipated that e.s.t. would become the most influential band in European jazz of the noughties. And when the band formed they probably didn't think they were particularly ‘jazz’ either; all they wanted to do was to play the music which united their passions: rock, pop, classical, folk, improvisation. In the following 15 years, e.s.t. would play thousands of concerts worldwide, release ten studio albums and several live recordings, win awards, gold discs. We all know how the story ends. Or did it really end? And will it ever end? To mark the 30th anniversary of e.s.t., Magnus Öström and Dan Berglund combined forces with close musical friends Joel Lyssarides, Magnus Lindgren, Verneri Pohjola and Ulf Wakenius to give two major concerts, one at the Kölner Philharmonie and other at the Filadelfia church in Stockholm. They played a selection of quintessential pieces from the timeless e.s.t. repertoire, but in a way that has never been heard before. The six musicians, each one a solo artist of international renown, treat the original melodic and rhythmic contours of these tunes with tenderness and affection. The iconic melodies and rhythms are all there, but we also hear how they are opened up again and again, as the musicians immerse them in unexpected warmth and light. These players react to each other in fascinating ways, and there is also a definite tingle in the air as the audience listens to the music in pin-drop silence, then bursts into uninhibited applause atthe end. Magnus Öström reflects on how it feels to play this music today: “The emotions we experience have many layers, the depth of a lifetime. Firstly, it feels like coming home. There is sadness, gratitude, and happiness. And it seems unreal or even surreal and ever so natural at the same time. And you can't stop marvelling at how great this music is. Esbjörn’s compositions and the arrangements that we did together as a trio back then, feel timeless.” And he concludes: “In the end, what remains above all is the conviction that this music should be played and not lying around in a drawer.”“e.s.t. 30” zooms in from the widest of panoramas to the intimacy of the close-up. And from the total silence and weightlessness of space in the opener "From Gagarin's Point Of View" to the heartfelt sincerity of the final track "Believe, Beleft, Below", or as it is called in the later version with vocals: "Love is Real". “If we meet again, I'd tell you how I feel, I'd tell you from the start, I'd tell you love is real.” Love remains.

Bill Laurance & The Untold Orchestra - BloomCD / Vinyl / digital Bill Laurance piano, fender rhodes mk8, osmose expressive, prophet 6 Rory Storm conductor The Untold Orchestra A series of dark, warm string chords opens the curtain on a vista of spaciousness and great sonic depth.Soon after, an intense rhythm develops, classically light and tightly grooving at the same time. A crystalline piano melody develops over everything, leading into an imaginative, hypnotically intensifying improvisation.Bloom sees 5-time Grammy-winning composer and pianist Bill Laurance once more expanding his sonic palette. He has returned to his classical roots, working with arranger Josh Poole and 18 string players from Manchester’s Untold Orchestra to produce an album on a convincingly epic scale. Conceptually, Laurance says the record was largely inspired by his child’s capacity to imagine and create other worlds: “Every decision we take can be traced back to our capacity to imagine, the only limits on what we can achieve are the scale of our dreams. My child’s ability to pull back the curtain of reality and to create a fantasy world ignited all kinds of possibilities for me, and that is what ultimately led to this music.” Combining Laurance’s classical sensibilities with jazz, pop grooves, and powerful orchestral synchronicity, Bloom runs the gamut of emotions and moods. Whether it’s flowing dreamscapes or dramatic crescendos, listeners are taken to exactly where they want to be, without ever veering off into the predictable.

Joachim Kühn - EuropeanaCD / Vinyl / digital Joachim Kühn piano Jean-Francois Jenny Clark bass Jon Christensen drums Django Bates horn Douglas Boyd oboe Klaus Doldinger soprano saxophone Richard Galliano accordion Christof Lauer soprano saxophone Albert Mangelsdorff trombone Markus Stockhausen trumpet The jazz symphony "Europeana" is a central work in the ACT catalogue. It epitomises the power of jazz that spans regions, times, styles and personalities. And to mark the 80th birthday of its key figure Joachim Kühn, this milestone is now available on vinyl for the first time. Alongside Joachim Kühn, the album brings together the crème de la crème of contemporary European improvised music, including Albert Mangelsdorff, Django Bates, Klaus Doldinger and Richard Galliano, backed by the NDR Radio Philharmonic Orchestra Hanover. The album, released in 1995 and written by the English composer and arranger Michael Gibbs, combines the rich European musical tradition with the language of jazz. Symphonic music, swing, free jazz, blues and flamenco - all this merges into a unique, timeless music without borders.

Emile Parisien - Let Them CookCD / Vinyl / digital Emile Parisien soprano saxophone & effects Julien Touéry piano Ivan Gélugne double bass Julien Loutelier drums & electronics When accidents happen, they are normally over in seconds, sometimes minutes; this one has been going on for 20 years. It is two decades since the members of Emile Parisien’s quartet played a jam session together. At the end, they looked at each other in disbelief. They had not just been hit by a collective musical thunderbolt, they also knew they had just brought...well...something...into being. The common ground between them was jazz, but each had all kinds of seeds to sow in it, from classical music and contemporary sounds to rock, electronica and chanson. Saxofonist Emile Parisien, Pianist Julien Touéry, Bassist Ivan Gélugne and drummer Julien Loutelier rip up labels, break down barriers, upset codes, and yet they know exactly where they are headed. There is a shared obsession with narrative. “The central axis of the quartet has always been storytelling,” Parisien emphasizes.“Let Them Cook” is like a breath of fresh air, and with a band sound now firmly and unmistakably of 2024 rather than 2004. There was a particular turning point: at a concert in Sweden near the end of their “Double Screening” album tour, they had taken a chance and tried out a move from an entirely acoustic sound to incorporate some electronics.It worked, so they stayed with it: they found that these electronic punctuations never polluted the band’s DNA, but rather stimulated it. The electronic apparatus was clearly additive to the stories of these compositions, the way it all fitted together was astounding.Which brings us back to the ever-present question: how do you get away from the classic jazz quartet of sax, piano, bass and drums? “We’re always trying to find the answer! There’s no point in redoing what the John Coltrane and Wayne Shorter groups did, because in many ways you’ll never reach their level.” “There’s a certain road in life most people walk on,” Wayne Shorter once said, “because it’s familiar, and they can jostle to get in front. I prefer to take a different road that’s less crowded, with many forks, where you get a wider view of life. I call it ‘the road less travelled’. That’s where I want to be.” In the year which marks its 20th anniversary, Emile Parisien’s quartet has never been more in tune with the thinking of one of its main influences.Credits:Produced by the artists

Victoria Tolstoy - Stealing MomentsCD / Vinyl / digital Viktoria Tolstoy vocals Joel Lyssarides piano & keys Krister Jonsson guitar Mattias Svensson bass Rasmus Kihlberg drums & percussion Viktoria Tolstoy's ACT debut album, "Shining On You" from 2004, can now be seen as a defining moment, marking the beginning of the continuing success story of popular jazz voices from Scandinavia. The music was written by Esbjörn Svensson, who also formed the core band together with Dan Berglund and Magnus Öström and was soon to become world-famous as "e.s.t.". The album, produced by Nils Landgren, was also a gath-ering of the ACT family of artists - also in its infancy back then - who joined the session as guests.Exactly 20 years later, in "Stealing Moments", Viktoria Tolstoy has once again taken up the idea of “the family" making music together. The compositions are by a whole host of current ACT artists, many of whom had an involvement in "Shining on You". It includes "Hands Off", originally an instrumental composition by the late Esbjörn Svensson; Svensson's widow Eva has written a very fine new lyric for it. Long-time friends and companions - Nils Landgren, Ida Sand, Wolfgang Haffner, Cæcilie Norby, Lars Danielsson, Iiro Rantala and Jan Lundgren - have all written new music specifically with Tolstoy and her voice in mind. "When you sing, the sun rises," Pat Metheny once told Viktoria Tolstoy. The thread which unifies all the tracks on "Stealing Moments" is her strong, crystal clear voice, together with her temperament, in which lightness and coruscating energy always irresistibly co-exist. Listeners are going to enjoy this music as much as she does...and she knows it. Or as she says, subtly re-forming the words of the album title into an implicit invitation: "Let me steal a little bit of time to listen." Credits: Produced by the artist

Michael Wollny & Joachim Kühn - DUOCD / Vinyl / digital Michael Wollny piano Joachim Kühn  piano Joachim Kühn (b. 1944) and Michael Wollny (b. 1978) are two of the leading lights of the European jazz piano. The playing of each of them is unmistakable, their approaches to making music are completely individual, and in a whole multitude of ways. As outstanding virtuosos, they are both capable of finding stylistic pathways to connect the most diverse areas of contemporary music. They both have alert and enormously creative minds, together with a protean capacity to listen and respond with the right thing at the right moment, something which is going to surprise each other. Together, Kühn and Wollny cover a wide range of original compositions and a version of Ornette Coleman's "Somewhere". At the end, they come together for a joint requiem for Joachim's brother Rolf.These two improvising pianists have wordless ways of communicating and intuitive ways of finding consensus, whether they are dealing with very basic things or huge amounts of detail. They work on their combined music like two sculptors chiselling on the same sculpture. Sometimes everything is quite clear, sometimes it is impossible to distinguish who is in the foreground and who is in the background, who is playing on the left and who is on the right. This album is released in co-operation with Château Palmer. Credits: Produced by the artists

Nils Landgren - Christmas with My Friends VIIICD / Vinyl / digital Nils Landgren trombone & vocals Sharon Dyall vocals Jonas Knutsson saxophones Jeanette Köhn vocals Jessica Pilnäs vocals Ida Sand vocals & piano Johan Norberg guitars Clas Lassbo bass For large numbers of people, Nils Landgren's Christmas albums are now a part of their holiday season, just like advent calendars or mistletoe. Seventeen years ago, trombonist/singer Landgren, one of the brightest stars in the European jazz firmament, brought together some of his closest musical companions. To get themselves into the mood for Christmas, they set off on a tour of churches in Sweden and Germany. The album which resulted from that first tour, "Christmas With My Friends" was described by one critic as "the most beautiful of all Christmas CDs." Ever since then, Landgren and his friends have been repeating this special way of celebrating Christmas every other year. That time has come round again: "Christmas With My Friends VIII" is ready to take its place among the presents under the tree. These albums all have a wealth of different moods and colours, and that is what makes them so special, as each musician brings their own highly individual contribution. There is Landgren himself with his unrivalled flexible and velvety-smooth trombone, Jonas Knutsson with his lyrical saxophone playing, Johan Norberg and his folky guitar tone. Here for the first time, we also hear the sonorous bass of Clas Lassbo. Above all, however, it is the vocalists who give each track on the album its own special character, and also complement each other perfectly: the classical soprano singing of Jeanette Köhn, the bittersweet soul of Ida Sand, the radiant clarity of Jessica Pilnäs, the powerful blues of Sharon Dyall and, last but not least, the bright soul of Nils Landgren himself.The repertoire which Landgren – and increasingly his friends – choose is also remarkable for its many colours and for the extensive research work which has gone into finding it. There are carols, Christmas songs from pop and jazz, songs which are played all over the world appear alongside songs unknown outside their countries of origin; there is a range from. This time, Landgren and his friends have taken the idea of the richness of colour quite literally. "My Christmas is orange," Landgren says. "I wasn't keen on presents as a child, but far more interested in the holiday season food. That was what made up my Christmas: My mother Margareta brought a big bag of fresh oranges. I still remember when I peeled the first one, and then enjoyed the smell and the wonderful taste." That's why the glowing cover of "Christmas With My Friends VIII" is so...orange.Listeners are encouraged to associate colours with the tracks on the album. Who wouldn't be thinking of green with "O Tannenbaum", for example, especially when it is played, as here, in New Orleans Mardi Gras style. With the hymn-like "In Dulce Jubilo", which swirls around the classical vocals, it has to be gold. And everyone can imagine their own colours for tunes like the ethereal "Lully, Lalla, Lullay", the folky "Soon After Christmas" or the jazzy- "It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year"... just as Johan Norberg has done in his composition "That's How I Picture Christmas Eve". And there is clearly one colour that must not be missing: the colour of jazz: "When we had recorded everything, Ida Sand said: 'What about Blue Christmas?'" Landgren remembers. And so the album starts with the song by Bill Hayes and Jay Johnson, which gave Elvis Presley his breakthrough to fame, as a wonderfully rolling blues. There are so many colours represented here, and no doubt more will be added when the group tours Germany in December. All that remains is to wish them well: may your days be merry and bright, and may all your christmases be...colourful.Credits: Produced by Nils Landgren & Johan Norberg

Wollny - Haffner - Landgren - Danielsson - 4 Wheel Drive IICD / Vinyl / digital Nils Landgren trombone & vocals Michael Wollny piano Lars Danielsson bass & cello Wolfgang Haffner drums Four is a winner: that was the unanimous opinion of critics and audiences alike on the first album from German-Swedish supergroup 4 Wheel Drive. The eponymous debut disc from this band of bandleaders went straight to the top spot as best-selling jazz album in Germany for2019. And the media didn’t hold back with their praise either: "Four first-league jazz musicians with pure joy of playing and a love of good pop music", said ZDF's “heute-journal” about this spirited and enjoyable group, which combines trombonist/singer Nils Landgren, pianist Michael Wollny, bassist/cellist Lars Danielsson and drummer Wolfgang Haffner. AllAboutJazz, a leading American jazz website, asked whether this album might be worth adding to a listener's collection, and answered the question succinctly:"4 sure".The same is manifestly true of the quartet's second studio album (there was also a live concert recording "4 Wheel Drive Live" in between, released in October 2019). In "4 Wheel Drive II", it is evident that things have shifted up a gear right from the start, with the rocky, pulsating opening track "Chapter II", straight from Wollny's compositional workbench. Landgren likes to let his trombone roar like a sports car engine. In similarly dynamic vein are pieces like Danielsson's final track of the album "The Wheelers", which, thanks to Haffner's nimble brushwork, makes you think you're on a high-speed train, or indeed Wollny's powerfully swinging "Spring Dance". Compared to the first album, there has been another change, an increase in the proportion of original compositions written by all of the participants, as Lars Danielsson, who has contributed a sensitive, poppy ballad to the new album "Just Another Hour", remarks. Interpretations of worldwide hit songs were a factor behind the huge success of the debut album, but the ratio to original compositions here is getting closer to 50:50. That said, the fuel powering 4 Wheel Drive has remained the same: this band is all about creating music from deep within, and with like-minded people whom you can absolutely and implicitly trust to be in the driving seat. "It just flows," enthuses drummer Haffner, "we're a group of close friends with nothing we need to prove, we can just go for it. I've had so many magic moments with this band, it really is incredible!"4 Wheel Drive was officially born at the end of 2017, at a special winter concert of the Jazz Baltica Festival, and Nils Landgren has described its entire history as having been blessed by "mutual respect and mutual love.". In the new album "4 Wheel Drive II", listeners are treated to several new moments of pure magic, continuing 4 Wheel drive’s illustrious story. For example, their new instrumental version of the Simon & Garfunkel classic "Sound of Silence", has something mysteriously Nordic about it. Or their newly-cast version of the surprisingly infrequently covered Genesis ballad "Hold On My Heart" putting it into a jazz context. If there's anyone who can sing a Phil Collins number without it being embarrassing, it's Nils Landgren. That idea also applies to Elton John's "Your Song" or Paul Simon's "Still Crazy After All These Years". The courage to approach pop tunes that have become so ingrained in many people's minds from a completely different perspective pays off in full. Because within 4 Wheel Drive are four originals at work, each of whom can be recognised from the very first note they play or sing.Michael Wollny doesn't see the playing of popular hits as a burden in any way, but rather as a freeing-up. "Songs that are so well-known give you the opportunity to be completely open to the moment," says the pianist. "In this band, the song selection allows us great freedom. It's like our concerts, where anything can happen. Drummer Haffner agrees: "There's nothing wrong with interpreting a great song in your own way. If you do it with deep conviction, you are always going to connect with people." Credits: Produced by Andreas Brandis with the artists Recorded by Joar Hallgren and Michael Dahlvid at Nilento Studio, Gothenburg, April 17 - 19, 2023 Additional recording by Lars Nilsson at Nilento Studio, June 2, 2023 Mixed and mastered by Arne Schumann The Art in Music: Cover art by Peter Krüll

Esbjörn Svensson Trio e.s.t. - Good Morning Susie SohoCD / Vinyl / digital Esbjörn Svensson piano Dan Berglund bass Magnus Öström drums Traditionally, jazz is by invitation only. Those in the know guard their secrets tightly, and deviants are regarded with a certain amount of suspicion. To be commercial is to sell out and if you sell out you'll loose the hard core fans. Not so with Esbjörn Svensson Trio. The trio has sold three times as many albums as jazz acts normally do, but they still manage to stay on the good side of jazz aficionados and critics. The trio plays upwards of 100 shows each year to a very varied audience. Besides the usual jazz audience you'd be as likely to spot a little old lady as an advertising exec or high school kids. This year, the trio will include matinees on their tours to give their younger fans a chance to see them live. Their favourite moments are spent improvising on stage, and this is how they keep their material fresh and ever evolving. No two shows are the same and to a large extent, the band tries to capture this loose, improvisational vibe on record, and they rarely do more than one take in the studio. The recording process that led to "From Gagarin's Point of View" (ACT 9005-2), that also became the first Swedish jazz video shown on MTV, is significant to how the band works: “We were working on another project, and had a few hours to spare, so we sat down and played a few songs”, Esbjörn says. “Those songs make up about half the album, with the other half recorded in two similar sessions”. “Keeping the spontaneity is extremely important to us”, explains Magnus. Esbjörn Svensson can't imagine life without music. He's been making noise for as long as he can remember; on pots, pans, tabletops and briefly playing the mandolin before settling in by the piano. Grade school was spent planning tours and designing album covers for the bands he was in, most of them including drummer Magnus Öström. 1993 Dan Berglund joined the band, and the three of them have since held what they call a "musical conversation" ­ the critics call it "breathlessly beautiful", "the most touching moment I've ever heard on record", "a brutal force" and "jazz at it's best". The critical acclaim and awards haven't changed how the three good friends view their musicianship. “We set the highest standards for ourselves. What anybody else thinks is secondary”, Dan states. “We are still inspired by any and all music; Björk is one of my personal favourites”, says the former metalhead. No surprise then, that the collaborations that the trio has been involved in have spanned a wide variety of Sweden's most successful artists. Their 1997 recorded album "Winter in Venice" (ACT 9007-2) received the Swedish Grammy. 1999 EST has participated in Cool Sweden at Midem in Cannes as well as the Swedish Jazz Extravaganza in London. The same year the group also has played at the Kongsberg Jazz Festival, the Montreux Jazz Festival along with Eagle Eye Cherry and Nils Landgren, at the Red Sea Jazz Festival in Israel together with Viktoria Tolstoy and at the Hultsfreds Festival. Besides that there have been tours to Germany, Switzerland, England, Nothern Ireland and South Africa, and the group has shared the stage and master classes with Chick Corea, John Scofield, Brad Mehldau Trio and others. Credits: Recorded at Atlantis Studio, March - April 2000 Mixed in May 2000 Technician: Janne Hansson Mastered by Johan Ekelund at Stereolab in June 2000 Produced by e.s.t.

Esbjörn Svensson - HOME.SCD / Vinyl / digitalEsbjörn Svensson pianoThere are only a few figures in music whose work influences and shapes a genre as a whole. This is undoubtedly true of the Swede Esbjörn Svensson. With his trio e.s.t., the pianist and composer wowed audiences beyond age and genre affiliations. And his influence on jazz as a whole reverberates to this day and already within the second and third generation of musicians worldwide. HOME.S. is Esbjörn Svensson's only solo album and the sheer existence of such a recording and its completely unexpected discovery over a decade after its creation are nothing less than a sensation: Since the early 1990s, Svensson focused almost his entire creative energy and recording activities on his work with e.s.t.. Thus, these new recordings are not only the first, but practically the only ones that show Svensson in a setting other than that of the trio: Intimate, concentrated and completely one with himself. The recordings for HOME.S. were made only a few weeks before Esbjörn Svensson's sudden death on June 14, 2008. Svensson recorded the music in his Swedish home. For almost ten years afterwards, the album rested untouched in his wife Eva's personal archive. In this interview, she tells the story behind the discovery of the album and the music: How exactly did you find this music? After Esbjörn’s passing, I made sure all the contents of his computer were saved to backup hard drives. And then I basically left them untouched for the next ten years. At the point where I eventually felt ready to look into the material, I soon realised that there was something I wanted to look into. I took the hard drive and went to Gothenburg to meet with Åke Linton, the sound engineer who had worked on all e.s.t. albums as well as on their live shows. He was also the one who had helped me to save the material from Esbjörn’s computer in the first place. So he probably already knew that there was something hidden in there. But nobody had listened to it. We went to his studio. And we pressed the start button. Then there was a total silence and we couldn't speak for the entire time the music was playing. After it finished, at first we were not able to say anything, because we were both so touched and surprised that it was all there, and that it was so beautiful. The tracks seemed to follow one another like pearls on a string. After we just had sat there for a while we agreed: This is really good. Musically, but also from a sound perspective. At first Åke wasn't sure if Esbjörn had recorded everything at home and just by himself. So he called different studios in Stockholm that he knew Esbjörn was in contact with and asked them whether he had been there, recording anything. But no, he hadn't been anywhere. I know he had bought some very nice microphones and in the course of touring had learned from Åke how to use them. So it became clear that this music had to have been played and recorded in the basement of our house. So there was nobody with him? He was all alone doing that? He was all alone. In retrospect I have been thinking about it because the few people who know that this exists were asking me if I knew about it. What I did know was that Esbjörn was constantly working, as he always did. He was in the basement, and I could hear him play. But to me, this didn’t raise any questions. Is he doing something? Yes, of course he's doing something. That's what he always did. Rehearsing, practicing, composing. But for me it wasn’t clear that something new was happening. I did know that he was longing to have time to compose and play in different kinds of constellations, but I had no idea that it might be piano solo. Just weeks after making these solo recordings, Esbjörn died. Everything suddenly took on another perspective. There was no way for me to focus on music. All I could do at that time was to make sure all the material he was working on was kept safe.When did you hear the music for the first time? I think it was in 2017 or 18, maybe. This was really the first time? Yes, the first time. After almost ten years. And you kept everything safe and untouched until then? Technically, yes… Well, I don’t know about safety, because it was in the cupboard. *laughs* But safe enough to be released now anyway. Life changed so dramatically after Esbjörn’s passing. For me and for us, it was not just Esbjörn, the musician, it was my husband and the children's father who was gone. That was what we had to deal with and find a way to live without. What made you choose that the time was right to share this with the public? It was really not about choosing the right time. At the time when I heard the music, I simply understood that it was important for me that it happened. To be able to hear it and to have it physically in my hands. And when I realized this, I also wanted to share it with more people. By making an album and having it released, but also, just as importantly, by creating some spaces for myself and for others, to meet and to listen together and to hear the voice of Esbjörn.Do you know where the repertoire of the record comes from? Has any of this been previously written or do you think it’s fully improvised? I think individual tracks and compositions were prepared. At least I am sure there were some kind of sketches. I don't think Esbjörn was just sitting down improvising from start to end. It was not how I remember that he worked. There is actually a lot of sheet music around and I am sure some of it is connected with this recording, but I wasn’t able to go through all of it. Yet. You decided to have the tracks to be named after the letters of the Greek alphabet, and one reason to do so is Esbjörn’s passion for astronomy. Something that also inspired one of e.s.t.’s most popular pieces “From Gagarin’s Point of View”. There is this feeling of being far away from everything, in zero-g with a totally different perspective. And at the same time at great risk. Yes, I could imagine that Gagarin’s adventure and his urge to go to new places must have been so much more thrilling to him than his fear of death. To take that leap out into the universe and taking as opposed to just staying home. I don't think that was an option. In a musical way, Esbjörn was just like that. This is probably why the stars and space were such a big deal for him and what fascinated him about astronomy. At the same time I remember that he said that he in some way regretted that he learned more about it because then some amount of the mystery was gone. He was always keen to look into things that he didn't know that much about. And then in a way try to find out how they work and how they’re connected to other things. In life and in music. He heard something, but he didn't know how to connect it. And then he, and also Dan and Magnus of e.s.t. would explore things together, without any outside guidance. From their childhood days they would just meet at Esbjörn’s house, play around, explore and to find things out. Esbjörn knew the Greek alphabet by heart and also all of the Greek Zodiac signs. So along with this being a metaphor for the desire to explore and discover new spaces, by naming the pieces on the album just by Greek letters, we are not explaining something that we don't want to explain, and we leave space for the listeners to find their own associations with the music. Any closing thoughts? When the solo piano recordings were found at our home it felt like “getting a message smuggled over the border. This music is like having Esbjörn’s voice in the room. It couldn't be anybody else that played. Never. It is his voice. And he still has something to say. And I'm having the chance to let people hear that. My feeling is that we’re doing this together. …Thank you Esbjörn. This is beautiful. Credits: Music composed, recorded, mixed and produced by Esbjörn Svensson in spring 2008 Executive Producer: Eva Svensson Mastered by Åke Linton, Eva Svensson and Classe Persson at CRP Recording AB

Esbjörn Svensson Trio e.s.t. - e.s.t. Plays MonkCD / Vinyl / digital Esbjörn Svensson piano Dan Berglund bass Magnus Öström drums Thelonius Monk was one of the truly great piano geniuses on the international jazz scene. Esbjörn Svensson is one of the truly great piano talents on the Scandinavian jazz scene. In EST, who previously has released some critically acclaimed albums – „From Gagarin´s Point Of View „(ACT 9005-2), „Winter In Venice“ (ACT 9007-2) and lately „Good Morning Susie Soho“ (ACT 9009-2) – we have Magnus Öström on drums, Dan Berglund on double-bass and, of course, Esbjörn Svensson himself, who was an infant when he practically learnt to walk to the sound of „In Walked Bud“. „My father was and is a great jazz lover. So I was very young when I first came in touch with Monk´s music. He is the kind of composer that cannot be avoided“, says Esbjörn Svensson. „Plays Monk“ is the telling title of the CD from 1996 by Esbjörn Svensson Trio (EST), now released on ACT. Ten of the most beloved songs by Monk, from nocturnal, lovingly caressing „`Round Midnight“ to the gay and sprightly „Rhythm-A-Ning“, gets here a becomingly shining new colour. The music of Thelonius Monk is a peculiar mixture of simplicity and and complexity; of larguorous ballads and rhythms turned inside out. The music is a challenge. „You can always give it your personal touch“, explains Esbjörn. On „Plays Monk“you notice this over and over again. Credits: Recorded by Åke Linton and Johan Ekelund at Swedish Radio, Studio 9, January 1996 Mixed by Johan Ekelund and Bernard Löhr Produced by Johan Ekelund

Esbjörn Svensson Trio e.s.t. - e.s.t. Live 95CD / Vinyl / digital Esbjörn Svensson piano Dan Berglund bass Magnus Öström drums They have been lauded as the "New sound in the Old World", and as "high voltage out of Sweden"; the group has been called "possibly the best jazz trio in the world". The Esbjörn Svensson Trio's - known as EST - rise to the heights has been almost frightening. After their first major success in Sweden, their international breakthrough came in 1999 during the ACT World Jazz Night at the Montreux Jazz Festival. In the following years EST was a sensation throughout Europe, and they are now on the path to continuing their success story in the USA. It's no wonder that, especially when playing "live", EST lets loose an almost unbelievable energy - and this energy appears to grow from tour to tour - a rising star that shines ever brighter. Stars sometimes shine much longer than one would think. And here are recordings that demonstrate this is true for EST. The band, which was first formed in 1993, quickly found their very special sound. However, at first, no one outside EST's homeland was aware of them. Six years ago, in 1995, when Esbjörn Svensson still had long hair, and wore a headband, a record titled "Mr. And Mrs. Handkerchief", which consisted of live air shots from various towns in Sweden, was released. A year later, EST recorded the album "Esbjörn Svensson Trio Plays Monk" (recently re-released as ACT.). It reached the undreamed of sales of 10,000 CD's nationwide. Those who have heard how the trio played back then can attest that it was breathtaking music (for a quick listen: track 5).Much of what characterizes EST's play today was already well-defined in 1995: the unity and riveting strength of the inter-play, the compelling themes - themes that immediately jump out at the listener, and yet are never burdened with cliches. Then there are the musical influences of the likes of Thelonious Monk and Kieth Jarrett, which are fused into a unique style that is again and again infected by the forward-thrust of rock. Magic moments are preserved for posterity in these live takes. In tracks three and seven, Svensson plays on an upright piano that doesn't even come close to the brilliance and clarity of a concert grand - and yet, these recordings are pearls. The trio had by this time mastered the ability to react spontaneously to the inspiration of the moment.Absolutely no difference from today? On their latest tours EST sounded tighter, less raw, with the impetuosity of wilder times more under control. Comparison with the masterpiece "Dodge the Dodo" from the 1999 Montreux concert (bonus CD) shows that the trio's development has not been by leaps and bounds, but has been a continual process. Esbjörn Svensson himself has stated most clearly how much the music from past periods influences the band; "Obviously we develop all the time, both as individuals and as a group. But development isn't only about blind process. So instead of just going forward, in places we've chosen to refer back to our earlier sound, to what we had on our first two albums." That's already reason enough to pay new attention to "EST LIVE '95". Roland Spiegel, translated by Marty Cook Credits: Recorded by Åke Linton in March 1995, except # 11 recorded by Manu Guiot at Montreux Jazz Festival July 16, 1999, # 5 by Per Åke Hermansson, Radio Dalama and # 6 by Verner Kjersgaag, DR Östjüllands Radio Mixed by Åke Linton at Bohus Studio Produced by e.s.t.