Robinson Khoury: Transara CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / Limited white vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Robinson Khoury trombone, modular synths, lead vocal in 6, 9Anissa Nehari percussions, voice in 6, 9Léo Jassef piano, synths, voice in 6, 9Trombonist/composer Robinson Khoury is one of the most prominent and visible rising stars on the French jazz and cross-genre scene. A charismatic live performer, his breakthrough came in 2024 with the album MŸA, featuring his trio with percussionist Anissa Nehari and keyboardist Léo Yassef. This group, in which Khoury plays not just trombone but also modular synths – he sings as well – became a tightly-knit and vibrant musical unit; the title of their debut album became the band name Robinson Khoury MŸA. This trio now takes centre stage on their ACT debut album, Transara.“I really like the unusual,” says Khoury. “Strange combinations, unexpected line-ups. Trombone, modular synths, keyboards and percussion...I’d never heard anything like it (!), and that’s exactly what fascinated me.” And there are other important affinities within the group: “I think that part of the reason we work so well together is because we share a Mediterranean heritage through our families – the Mediterranean connects us.” Equally formative, he explains, has been their life based in Paris, a world city where a wide variety of influences converge.For Khoury, Transara marks an important step forward. He describes the first MŸA album as having been a kind of “embryo” in which a musical entity was slowly taking shape, and that the trio has made huge strides since then. The three have become fluent in the musical language which they share. According to Khoury, their organic and intuitive music moves “into another world, another reality”. This progression is what the title Transara signifies: a transition between worlds, a connection of spaces and states.Robinson Khoury has had a fascinating, broad and transformative musical journey. Growing up in Lyon as the son of a jazz pianist and a jazz singer, music was ever-present right from the start. He sang in the highly renowned Maîtrise (children’s choir) of the Opéra de Lyon, and spent his summers at the Jazz à Vienne festival. The turning point came at the age of eleven, when his voice broke and he had to leave the choir. In search of a new form of expression, he discovered the trombone: “I was looking for an instrument through which I could continue to sing – and the trombone was perfect for that.” Just a few years later, he was studying at the Conservatoire in Lyon while also playing in jazz clubs. From an early age, he moved between classical and jazz, developing an openness to different styles.At around the age of 18, he also discovered Arabic music – singers such as Egyptian icon Umm Kulthum and South Asian legend Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan – and they left a lasting impression. Although Khoury has Lebanese roots, this music was not initially a natural part of his everyday life; all the more so, it felt like a direct form of expression for him on the trombone. “What I particularly love about Arabic music is the singing. Translating this onto the trombone felt very natural, as it is like a second voice to me.” Soon, musicians such as Ibrahim Maalouf and Natacha Atlas became aware of him, and invited him to join their bands. Khoury also founded the sextet Sarāb, which likewise blends Arabic music and jazz. All of these multiple sides of Khoury’s musical identity – jazz, Arabic music, the means to be expressive as an instrumentalist from his classical training, plus his love of singing and his motivation for change – find a reflection in Transara. The music is also a deeply-felt commentary on our times, constantly shifting between melancholy and warmth. “Given the state of the world around us, one cannot help but be pensive and melancholic,” says Robinson Khoury. At the same time, he says, his aim is to create a safe space where musicians and the audience feel secure and at ease, a place where feelings and thoughts can be shared. The track “Poussière” (dust) encapsulates all of this particularly well. Khoury explains that it is about the lives of all the people who “leave us too soon”. At the same time, there is a comforting perspective in this: “They haven’t simply vanished. The dust remains part of this planet; we breathe it in; it is a part of us.” And from this idea springs hope – the certainty that the past continues to have an effect and helps us to “continue to hope and to breathe”. CreditsRecorded in October 2025 at Studio Gil Evans, AmiensRecorded & mixed by Mathieu PionMastered by Pierre-Emmanuel MeriaudComposed by Robinson Khoury, except 8 (composed by Léo Jassef)Photo by Sylvain Gripoix

Johanna Summer: Dialoge CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Johanna Summer piano Claire Huangci piano Danae Dörken piano Kit Armstrong piano Igor Levit pianoIt was a very special experience. Pianist Igor Levit went on to describe it as one of the “most artistically fulfilling moments of recent years”. To be wandering through Robert Schumann’s familiar “Waldszenen” (forest scenes)... and then suddenly to veer off onto new and unexpected paths: that was what the audience at the 2023 Lucerne Piano Festival witnessed during the first onstage encounter of pianists Johanna Summer and Igor Levit. Levit played first, starting with the opening piece from Schumann’s cycle of Romantic piano pieces in its original form; Summer then responded by picking up the thread of each of these miniatures in turn and, with an improvisation based on what she had heard, gave a magical account of the places where her musical intuition can take her. Nothing about this evening had been planned; the dialogue between Schumann’s classic pieces and the variations which Summer based on them had complete freedom, everything happened in the moment...Johanna Summer’s collaboration with producer Andreas Brandis has been steadily building traction. Their first venture was a highly acclaimed solo album, "Resonanzen"; that was followed by "Cameo", a duo album with saxophonist Jakob Manz, and the concert in Lucerne became the catalyst for the new album "Dialoge" (dialogues). The context here is four duos. Each of them features Summer on one of two grand pianos, with another pianist – Claire Huangci, Kit Armstrong, Danae Dörken and Igor Levit – on the other. The objective is to create an open-ended conversation between tradition and the present, between composition and improvisation. As for the repertoire, Summer’s studio guests were encouraged to take as much liberty as they wanted. As the pianist explains: “I asked them to bring along pieces they have a real affinity with...which would make it fine when I added something extra.” Johanna Summer deliberately kept herself in the dark as to which pieces her co-performers had chosen, until they actually started playing. To keep a completely open mind towards the music, she even made sure she left the room while her colleagues were warming up before the recording. The element of surprise is important here. It gives rise to the enormously daring, dynamic effect that Dialoge leaves on the listener. It was particularly appealing for Summer to be able to immerse herself in her duet partners’ very personal musical choices. She explains: “With his Greek heritage, Danae chose a Greek focus, with compositions by Manolis Kalomiris and Mikis Theodorakis. Zhou Tian’s ‘Prelude’ was written specifically for Claire; the two have known each other since their student days. Igor, in turn, brought along ‘Andantino de Clara’, a piece written by Robert Schumann – which, given our shared history, was of course a perfect fit. And Kit brought a lot to the programme, but in an unconventional way with spontaneous quotes from his repertoire – ranging from the Renaissance to the Viennese Classical era.”The improvisational reworking of classical and contemporary works is far less common than improvisation on, say, jazz or pop standards. So Summer’s unusual approach has raised the hackles of some critics. For instance, following the pianist’s acclaimed performance at the Lucerne Piano Festival, an established classical music critic remarked that this way of engaging with the piano tradition “fits into our fake-obsessed present, in which the distinction between original and forgery is becoming increasingly blurred.” Johanna Summer herself is very clear on that point: she is not attempting to impose some kind of rebrand onto European classical music, and is certainly not doing what she does for effect. Rather, she is concerned to bring her own personal and deeply sincere perspective to the musical source materials. “What interests me most is to ask the question: What does this work really want to tell us?” I try to define what attitude and what energy are contained within it – and figure out how I am going to translate that into my own personal vocabulary, which is not drawn solely from classical music. It’s about recognising the essence of a piece for oneself and developing a way of interpreting it. In principle, that is what classical pianists do, they are interpreters. The most beautiful moments are those when you unexpectedly discover a little gem, whether it’s a lovely phrase or an unusual chord combination, and are completely spellbound for a moment. It reminds me of a feeling I used to have as a child. When I was tidying a cupboard, I would find a long-forgotten toy. Suddenly, in that moment, a whole cosmos of creativity unfolds.”Is this classical music? Is it jazz? Does it matter? Johanna Summer doesn’t see herself as a ‘jazz pianist’ – she’s simply a pianist. Piano icon Joachim Kühn, himself a great connector of genres and eras, describes what Johanna Summer does as ‘music full of imagination and beyond categorisation’. Whether she is improvising as a soloist, in a duo with classical musicians, or alongside musicians who cross genres naturally, such as Malakoff Kowalski or Chilly Gonzales, Johanna Summer’s musical imagination seems to know no bounds. Every encounter with the instrument and other musicians is a new beginning. And Johanna Summer is inimitable; she always ends up sounding entirely like herself. CreditsRecorded 19.06. and 23.07.2025 at Emil Berliner StudiosRecorded by Lukas KowalskiMixed and mastered by Emanuel UchProduced by Andreas BrandisPhotos by Gregor Hohenberg, Ilan HamranCover art by Małgorzata Szymankiewicz, Untitled 390, 2025,acrylic on canvas, 100 × 90 cmUsed by kind permission of the artist and

Mahan Mirarab: Unspoken CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Mahan Mirarab guitar, fretless guitar, oud Kian Soltani cello featured on #9,11, 5 Lars Danielsson bass featured on #7, 3 Golnar Shahyar vocals featured #8Unspoken, the ACT debut album from Mahan Mirarab, opens up a whole world of personal, deeply felt stories. The Iranian-born, Vienna-based guitarist draws on his experience of East and West, darkness and beauty, sorrow and joy. His music reveals perspectives which are profoundly human, intimate and sensitive, in album which is emerging at a time full of tensions and contradictions. He performs solo on the double-neck guitar and on some tracks is also joined by Kian Soltani (cello), Lars Danielsson (double bass) and Golnar Shahyar (vocals). His is a unique and personal musical journey: jazz blends with influences from classical and folk music from Iran, with European chamber music, imbued profoundly with the spirit of song.Mahan Mirarab was born in Tehran. He started playing piano and guitar as a child and, at the age of 14, joined a Pink Floyd cover band as a bassist. Through the Tehran underground scene, Mahan Mirarab came into closer contact with Western music such as jazz and progressive rock. Resources were scarce; the music was mainly learned recordings on black-market traded cassettes. Through these, Mahan Mirarab also discovered the music of American jazz musicians such as Bud Powell, Chick Corea and George Benson. He listened to their music so often that he could soon sing along to every single solo and eventually transcribed them for the guitar. All this was a considerable risk, as Mahan Mirarab recalls: “Owning music cassettes was a criminal offence. I had a friend who ended up in prison because of a copied jazz tape.” Yet Mirarab’s curiosity for this unfamiliar music burned brightly. One group in which he played in was a Weather Report covers band which mainly performed at events in embassies. The Austrian ambassador in Teheran was a huge Joe Zawinul fan and it was he who gave assistance to Mahan Mirarab – who had long since made it his aim to discover the (musical) world beyond his homeland – to leave the country. This is how Mirarab arrived in Vienna in 2009, and it is where he still lives today. Once he had moved to Vienna, Mahan Mirarab, who had previously studied architecture in Iran, made the decision not to pursue a degree in music. He preferred to get to know the scene, launch his own projects and, above all, play the music that suited him personally, far removed from institutional structures. In 2009, he recorded his first trio album, which explored jazz from a Persian perspective. This approach gradually gained him a foothold in the scene; he played concerts in local jazz clubs and at smaller festivals, and he was able to forge important contacts. His first international experiences followed, and eventually a joint project with his wife, the singer Golnar Shahyar, became an international success, with concerts worldwide and attention growing. At the same time, Mahan Mirarab felt increasingly that he could only hold his own if he was able to constantly demonstrate every facet of his skill as a musician and composer. This imperative was something which grew in him without his being fully aware of it. It was a kind of survival strategy for the new environment, but the effect was that he felt somehow driven to be constantly aspiring for perfection.When ACT director and producer Andreas Brandis first became aware of Mahan Mirarab, the musician promptly sent him a whole mountain of varied material to consider. But it was one small solo sketch that really clicked: “Among the tracks I’d sent to ACT was a ‘first idea’,” recalls Mahan Mirarab, “and Andreas Brandis and Michael Gottfried from the label said pretty quickly: ‘That’s the one, let’s delve deeper into this and produce a whole solo album together.’ That way of working was something that I found very liberating, like being given permission not to always need to show everything I can do, but simply being allowed to be myself.” Mahan Mirarab and Andreas Brandis met in person several times, including once in Paris. They also spoke a lot on the phone and discussed a host of solo ideas which ultimately formed the basis for the album Unspoken.It was during this collaborative process that the idea arose to invite guests for some tracks on the album. For example, the classical cellist Kian Soltani also hails from Iran. As Mahan Mirarab notes, there are also other important similarities between the two: “Kian is a perfect classical cellist, but he’s also a really good improviser, and a brilliant composer too. I wrote cello parts for him, and he completely rearranged them and brought a whole load of great creativity to the table.” Mahan Mirarab has long been familiar with bassist Lars Danielsson, even though the two only met in person recently. “I’ve known Lars since my time in Iran – I mean, from a recording with John Abercrombie. Later, I learnt many of his compositions, just for myself because I liked them so much. In both his compositions and his improvisations, Lars has this incredible awareness of dynamics, harmony and space in the music. It was important to me to get to know him as a person too. That’s why I flew to Gothenburg especially to make sure I could record with him in the same room. Although there was plenty of space there, we sat very close together – which made our playing together particularly intense and immediate.” The relationship with the singer Golnar Shahyar couldn’t be closer: she and Mahan Mirarab are also a couple in real life. Having spent a great deal of time together on stage and in the studio since 2011, they have focused more on their own projects in recent years. But there remains a special connection and affinity. Their great skill, deep familiarity and emotional empathy are palpable on the album. Indeed, there is not a shadow of a doubt: everything about Unspoken is personal. The tracks “Banoo” and “A Way to Mourn” tell the story of Mahan Mirarab’s grandmother, who passed away during the recording sessions. In the track “Jina”, the personal meets the collective: in Kurdish, the title means “life” and is inextricably linked to the young woman Jina Mahsa Amini, whose death in the custody of the Iranian morality police in 2022 sparked a nationwide protest movement. These were events that profoundly changed Mahan Mirarab. For a long time, he was unable to write about them; it was only working on Unspoken that gave him the courage to do so. “Sparkling” is Mahan Mirarab’s favourite track, penned by his wife Golnar, and the version of “In a Silent Way” is a nod to Joe Zawinul, whose influence once proved to be the opener of so many doors in his life. And the instrument Mahan Mirarab used to record Unspoken is also a bespoke, one-off creation by Turkish luthier Ekrem Özkarpat: a double-necked guitar with both a fretless and a fretted fingerboard. This instrument serves as a metaphor for the two worlds between which Mahan Mirarab has moved and which meet in his music: the Western world structured on semitones and the microtonal world of his native country.If one asks Mahan Mirarab how he feels about the current situation in Iran and how this is reflected in his music, he has to think about it for a long time. “It’s difficult to witness what’s happening right now from a distance. I lived in Iran for 25 years, have an incredible number of memories, and my parents and many of my friends still live there. That makes me very sad. But my connection to my country of origin isn’t a national one. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter where wars and conflicts take place – it’s always about people who feel the same way all over the world. I think it’s important to remain attentive, sensitive and empathetic, to reflect in some way on what is happening around us.” It is this human reflection on the world with all its inherent contradictions that makes Unspoken so unique, moving and fulfilling.CreditsMusic composed & arranged by Mahan Mirarab, except 6 (traditional folklore music from Mazandaran, North of Iran), 12 (Joe Zawinul), 8 (Golnar Shahyar), 10 (Andrey Babayev); cello lines in 5 and 11 arranged by Mahan Mirarab & Kian SoltaniProduced by Mahan Mirarab & Andreas BrandisA Way to Mourn & Lars in Isfahan recorded on December 4 at Tia Dia Studios, Mölnlycke, Sweden, by Åke LintonChoopan 42, Sparkling Dark Gaze, Weißensee, Jina recorded on January 12 at Westbahnstudios, Vienna, by Farhad KhanbilverdiSolo tracks recorded on December 14 & 28 at Creative Cluster, Vienna, by Mahan MirarabMixed by Christoph BurgstallerMastered by Klaus ScheuermannPhoto by Victoria NazarovaMahan performs on guitars built by Ekrem ÖzkarpatKian Soltani appears courtesy of Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft

Michael Wollny & Emile Parisien: FreiheitACT Shop Exclusive!CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g)  Emile Parisien soprano saxophoneMichael Wollny pianoOn their new duo album, Michael Wollny and Emile Parisien invite listeners into a conversation shaped by trust, intuition and complete artistic freedom. Recorded in concert as part of the Bodenseefestival 2025, the album captures two singular musical voices meeting in a space where nothing is controlled, nothing is predetermined, and every gesture becomes a response to the moment.“Here, you are invited to witness one of our many conversations with Michael Wollny, in complete freedom and spontaneity. I feel the rare privilege of sharing this space with such an exceptional musician – someone with a profound sense of listening, where everything becomes possible. It is an honor to have met him and to be able to express myself in this way by his side, especially in the world we live in today. Thank you, Michael, for this passion and for your remarkable musical intelligence.” (Emile Parisien) “In this duo we neither control nor plan. We listen to what the music reveals, allowing it to lead us to places we could never have anticipated. It is a deep pleasure and an honor to experience these precious moments on stage with my friend, the one and only Emile Parisien, who magically opens all doors of perception and possibility. Thank you for being on this journey together, and sharing our mutual intuition of musical freedom – the ability to really play.” (Michael Wollny) Between Wollny’s profound sensitivity at the piano and Parisien’s fearless imagination on saxophone, the music unfolds as a shared act of discovery. Their dialogue is guided by deep listening: melodies appear, doors open, and unexpected paths emerge with striking clarity. What results is a rare encounter between two artists who allow the music itself to lead, revealing the beauty of spontaneity, friendship and mutual trust. CreditsRecorded on 26 May 2025 at Gnadenkirche Allensbach, presented by Bodensee Festival Recording & Sound Direction: Martin Pilger Recording Engineers: Yue Liu, Martin Pilger Mastered by Klaus ScheuermannPhotography: Jörg Steinmetz Cover art © Katja Strunz, Courtesy Contemporary Fine Arts Design by Siggi Loch A production of Südwestrundfunk, 2025 The concert was recorded at 26. JAZZ am SEE Allensbach in the Ev. Gnadenkirche, as part of the Bodensee Festival 2025, with Michael Wollny appearing as Artist in Residence.

Joel Lyssarides: Late on EarthCD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / Limited Curacao Blue Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital Joel Lyssarides piano Niklas Fernqvist bass Rasmus Blixt drumsFor Swedish pianist Joel Lyssarides, substance and depth always take precedence over flashy concepts, emotion and expression over mere virtuosity. Making music, he says, is like searching for grains of sand in the desert — a continuous journey of many small steps. His music thrives on detail: the finest nuances, subtle shifts in harmony, groove and dynamics. And on a distinctive piano sound — crystal clear, yet never sharp. The fact that Lyssarides’ music has now surpassed 100 million streams shows that this quiet intensity resonates with audiences around the world.Lyssarides belongs to a generation of European jazz musicians who left stylistic boundaries behind long ago. He is a sought-after collaborator – currently as a pianist alongside Nils Landgren, as part of the e.s.t. tribute project with Dan Berglund and Magnus Öström, and also as a composer for pop productions and video game music. Yet the piano trio remains at the heart of his work. It is the formation in which his musical universe unfolds most directly.Joel Lyssarides’ new album Late on Earth has been developed in an unusually long and intensive process. Over more than four years, the music has developed in close exchange with producer Andreas Brandis – a creative dialogue that encouraged Lyssarides to explore new paths. “It was almost therapeutic. On the one hand Andreas knows what makes me tick, and what I can do musically, but I also shared many of my doubts with him. In the end we decided everything together: the choice of the line-up, the studio – in this case the legendary Bauer Studios – the songs, the final takes. That helped me enormously, and I think I’ve never captured who I am and what I feel as honestly as this on a recording.” And there’s also a thought that makes him smile: “For the first time, I even have pieces on an album in a major key!”One important reason for the music’s emotional depth was Brandis encouraging Lyssarides to take more risks and to let go of the idea of perfection. “Especially at a time when music is increasingly digitally polished or even entirely generated by AI, Andreas was interested in the total opposite: the human element. In the end it’s often the small imperfections that make music come alive – music arises from immediate experience capturing the search for who you are, for your sound, your expression.”Joel Lyssarides’ music arises from immediate experience, rather than from any attempt to follow a conceptual agenda. “I sit down at the piano, feel something — and play, often for hours.” Many of the pieces on Late on Earth grew out of such moments: from sleeplessness, from love, from fleeting thoughts or small observations. For Lyssarides, it is a great joy when these small moments find their way out into the world and begin a life of their own. Sometimes this can feel almost surreal, as he describes: “Recently a pianist sent me his version of one of my pieces and wrote how much it meant to him. And I thought: wait a second – I wrote that tune at four in the morning...in my underwear.” Late on Earth is a collection of sincere musical snapshots — full of beauty, sometimes with rough edges, always carried by a profound emotional clarity. CreditsRecorded 07–08 July 2025 at Bauer Studios, Ludwigsburg Recorded, mixed and mastered by Adrian von Ripka Composed by Joel Lyssarides Produced by Andreas Brandis Photos by Andreas Brandis (Joel Lyssarides),Joel Lyssarides (Niklas Fernqvist; Rasmus Blixt)Cover art by Jiří Georg Dokoupil, used by kind permission of the artist© VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2026Design by Siggi Loch

Joachim Kühn: Joachim Kühn & Young LionsCD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital Joachim Kühn piano Jakob Bänsch trumpet AndrésColl marimba Nils Kugelmann bass Sebastian Wolfgruber drumsWhen Joachim Kühn was asked back in 2024 for his feelings about turning 80, his response couldn’t have been clearer: getting older annoys him. Rather than being sentimental about it or celebrating it, it’s something he’d rather resist, preferring to put his efforts into working against the threat of getting bored or distracted, and particularly against any hint that he might be stagnating.But when he is asked how he’s feeling or what he’s doing, his story takes a very different turn: "I'm more productive than I’ve ever been. My daily routine revolves entirely around music. I compose and improvise. Every day, and for hours on end." For Joachim Kühn, being 80-plus means above all one thing: not wanting to waste time. Practise...create...keep going. "What I want is to play with even more freedom," he says, "like all the great musicians at the end of their lives – Bach maybe, or John Coltrane." This irrepressible urge to become better, to avoid repetition, to try new things, has shaped Kühn's entire musical life. Classical music, free jazz, jazz rock, modern jazz, world music – Joachim Kühn is constantly on the lookout for new inspiration. And for musicians who will challenge him, force him to be on his mettle and to develop further.In the album Joachim Kühn & Young Lions, all of these needs are fulfilled. Kühn wrote a set of new music between December 2024 and January 2025 with the aim of recording it with people he had never played with before. "In terms of sound, my idea was trumpet and marimba," he recalls. One of the players was a certainty from the start: Andrés Coll, whom Joachim Kühn discovered in his adopted home of Ibiza, would take the vibraphone part. "He’s an incredible talent," says Kühn. One might have the thought that two virtuosos on harmony instruments could get in each other's way, but the opposite happens: Coll plays with no less density or intensity than Kühn, but instead of occupying each other's space, their notes mix like splashes of colour in a painting, creating new tones which are all the more intense.Finding the right trumpeter was less simple. "I listened to a lot of potential candidates, but none of them convinced me. Finally, my friend Roland Spiegel, jazz editor at Bayerischer Rundfunk, recommended the young Jakob Bänsch and played me his music. I knew from the very first minute that he absolutely had to be part of this." Bänsch visited Kühn in Ibiza, and together with Andrés Coll they rehearsed for four days, working on music that is extremely challenging to play, especially for the trumpet. The effort was worth it. On the album, Bänsch manages to strike a balance: his playing of Kühn's complex themes is clear and strong, but he also brings the agility and subtlety which the freely improvised sections require. The rhythm section of Young Lions came about through an encounter with ACT director Andreas Brandis. He instinctively liked the idea of a new band with young musicians, and played Kühn the album Life Score by the Nils Kugelmann Trio. Kühn and bassist Kugelmann met that very same day at the ACT offices in Berlin. "We took an instant liking to each other," Kühn remembers. "After our meeting, I listened to his music more intensively and thought: he's a perfect fit." That left the question of the drummer. After listening to Nils Kugelmann's album several times, the answer became clear: "Kugelmann and his drummer Sebastian Wolfgruber are a team! They know each other well and are a great fit for the new band." Like their fellow musicians, Kugelmann and Wolfgruber shine with mastery in two seemingly contradictory areas: weight, grounding, stability when the music requires it – but in the very next moment they are capable of completely free flight across all musical boundaries. All in all, Young Lions, recorded in the studio of Joachim Kühn's friend and producer Axel Kroell, has turned out to be a fortunate turn of events on many levels: for listeners, for the band and for the pianist/leader, who remarks: "These four guys, all in their 20s or early 30s, are the outstanding musicians of their generation – you know straight away that they're going to be huge. Actually, they already are. And as to what they'll be playing in a few years' time – I'm already excited by that. They really fired me up, we play absolutely as equal colleagues, I'm just totally thrilled!" Perhaps the most important message of the album is that combining different generations and personalities can produce a very special kind of cohesion and connection, and music which is so much more than the sum of its parts. In times of polarisation, it is something of a musical Utopia. Young Lions is the essence of that idea of jazz – which is also the essence of Joachim Kühn – one of its most important exponents anywhere in the world. CreditsRecorded August 27th to 28th 2025, at Polyester Studio, Munich, GermanyRecorded, mixed and mastered by Klaus ScheuermannAll music composed by Joachim KühnPiano tuner: Alex MahlerJoachim Kühn is a Steinway ArtistProduced by Axel KroellExecutive Producer: Andreas BrandisPhotos by Tibor Bozi Cover art by SHOSHU © 2025Used by kind permission of the artistDesign by Siggi Loch

Lars Danielsson: Echomyr CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Lars Danielsson double bass, cello, gimbri (#10), piano (#10), electric guitar (#6) Gregory Privat pianoJohn Parricelli guitar Magnus Öström drums & percussionGuests: Arve Henriksen trumpet on #3, 7Magnus Lindgren flute & alto flute on #6Carolina Grinne English horn on #8 Echomyr, the title of the fifth ‘Liberetto’ album from Swedish bass and cello master and composer Lars Danielsson, signifies music that has come from a particularly deep place in the soul. “The album title is a newly invented word,” he says. “The ‘echo’ part describes an expansive field where sound resonates; and ‘myr’ is an old Norse word for ‘moor’”. These are sounds from the depths, from deep within oneself. Especially now, we are asking ourselves what it is that makes each of us human and unique. And that is what I have been searching throughout my whole life as a musician: not simply to copy things that already exist, but to find something that comes from my own heart and from within myself."Echomyr sees Lars Danielsson continuing along his own distinct musical path, combining the freedom, harmony and rhythmic intensity of jazz with the vision of a cultivated sound that comes from his classical roots, together with the catchy melodies of popular and folk songs. Danielsson's compositions are unmistakable. He is a consummate melodist with a particular capacity to make complex things sound simple and natural. Danielsson, who grew up with rock and roll and free jazz, says that the way he used to compose was in a complicated way, with the aim of hiding behind the complexity. Today, what he seeks is the very opposite: clarity. ‘It's not difficult to write complicated music. But writing music that people will understand and that nevertheless has personality and depth – that's my goal.’ It is precisely this balance of depth and lightness that makes Danielsson's music so special – and on Echomyr he has taken it to a new stage in its evolution. For Danielsson, continuity and development are more valuable than the constant search for the new or the spectacular. He has been working with the core of his ‘Liberetto’ quartet – e.s.t. drummer Magnus Öström and renowned UK guitarist John Parricelli – for over 15 years. Tigran Hamasyan had the piano chair in the band in its early years, and since 2017 Gregory Privat has been the band's permanent pianist. Privat brings an ideal mix of extroversion and virtuosity with the kind of unselfish playing that works to the common good within the band and to bring out the very best in each song. In addition, three soloists appear on the album, and they are all musicians who share a characteristic: their instrumental playing is remarkable for its vocal quality, so they add their ‘voices’ to the album’s contrasted tracks: trumpeter Arve Henriksen, flautist Magnus Lindgren and Carolina Grinne on cor anglais. When composing, Danielsson says he thinks neither of what the market wants, nor of success. Over time, he has accumulated a substantial catalogue of compositions, and they form the starting point for him – often together with his wife and fellow musician Cæcilie Norby and close confidants from his label ACT – to work on the dramaturgy, to form the shape and the flow of an album that can really touch people. But even then, he says, his aim is not to please, but to create honest, deeply felt expression. This is how ‘Something She Said’, the last track on Echomyr, came about. It was inspired by images on the news from war zones such as Gaza and Ukraine. Danielsson does not respond with loudness or anger, but rather with thoughtfulness and compassion. An echo from within – this is music with sincerity.. and clarity...and timelessness.CreditsMusic composed by Lars Danielsson Horn arrangement on #3 by Arve Henriksen Recorded April 6-9 and Oct 28-31, 2025   Recorded and mixed by Bo Savik at Tia Dia Studios, Mölnlycke, Sweden Mastered by Klaus Scheuermann Piano tuning by Bengt Eriksson Photo by Peter PousardProduced by Cæcilie Norby, Magnus Öström & Lars DanielssonCover art Peter Krüll, used by kind permission of the artist Design by Siggi Loch

SHALOSH: What We Are Made OfCD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital Gadi Stern pianoDavid Michaeli double bassMatan Assayag drums“From the very start of SHALOSH, we have always said that we would never commit to any one genre but keep our music as open as possible,” drummer Matan Assayag says. “It’s the best way to bring ourselves fully to each song and the only way to stay truly authentic.” In more than a decade since its founding, the trio has made its signature this freewheeling, energetic and deeply-felt blend of jazz improvisation with everything from rock to Arabic music, western classical composition and pop melodics. Theirs is a journeying and infectiously engaging sound that has won fans from across the globe. What We Are Made Of, the band’s fourth album for ACT, impressively brings together all the influences that shape SHALOSH’s unmistakable overall sound.” Featuring a dazzlingly imaginative takes on ‘90s Europop anthem Barbie Girl, Oasis’ Don’t Look Back in Anger, Natalie Imbruglia’s early-noughties hit ballad Torn, Muses’ heavily rocking Hysteria and their own intricate, original compositions, the record is the group’s most open to date. It also marks the first time they have collaborated with a producer, ACT’s director, Andreas Brandis.“We’re a piano trio in a world of piano trios and with six albums already under our belt we wanted to make sure we kept pushing ourselves out of our comfort zone,” pianist Gadi Stern says. “That resulted in bringing outside compositions into the group that we could reimagine. It also meant enlisting Andreas, who we have known and valued for years, as our first producer. He really encouraged our approach and the result was immensely creative.” Workshopping their ideas across a week of intense rehearsals with Brandis in Berlin, the group honed their cover versions and originals into the nine final tracks on the album.“When I approach a cover I always look for something lacking in the performance that the composition has,” Stern says. “With Barbie Girl, it’s a brilliantly cynical song with great lyrics, it’s minor and has a melancholic melodic element to it but the performance is ‘90s Europop. I broke down all the elements to see how we could put it back together and make it more faithful to the essence of the song. While on Don’t Look Back in Anger I was on a walk during a trip to Tashkent in Uzbekistan and the groove for it just popped into my head. I recorded it on my phone and the whole idea only took 15 minutes.” Other tracks took longer to gestate, like the trio’s modernist jazz version of Torn. “We had previously recorded it for an album in 2018 but it didn’t make the cut because it was 12 minutes long and so messy,” bassist David Michaeli says. “We played it to Andreas during the Berlin sessions and he was great at telling us what to delete and what to keep and suddenly it made sense.” The trio’s originals, meanwhile, take shape in the achingly beautiful downtempo melodics of Ella Plays, which was inspired by Stern’s daughter Ella and the poetry of Khalil Gibran, the dark, swirling groove and vamping piano phrases of Point of Gravity and the meditative harmonics of Circle.“The band is ultimately a safe space for the three of us to freely express ourselves and share our opinions and ideas,” Mahan Assayag says. “We accept each other and all of our songs are a collective effort, which is what you hear in the finished music – the variety of influence and experience that makes us who we are. It’s why we called the album What We Are Made Of.“ SHALOSH celebrate freedom, the beauty of contrasts, the value of truly listening to one another, and the deeply human process of creative searching and finding — qualities that seem especially important right now.”„CreditsRecorded September 10–11, 2025Recorded by Klaus ScheuermannMixed and mastered by Klaus ScheuermannProduced by Andreas BrandisCover art by Ross Bleckner, used by kind permission of the artistDesign by Siggi Loch

Peter Somuah: Walking Distance CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Peter Somuah trumpet, flugelhorn                    Anton de Bruin rhodes, organ, keys Jens Meijer drumsMarijn van de Ven bassDanny Rombout percussion Heleen Vellekoop flute on #2Nia Ralinova cello on #2, 3 Since the release of his ACT debut Letter to the Universe (2023) and its follow-up Highlife (2024), Ghanaian-born trumpeter Peter Somuah, now based in Rotterdam, has established himself as a bridge-builder between cultures and continents. “An excellent musician and jazz at its most international,” notes the BBC. For the globetrotting Peter Somuah, musical influences from geographically distant cultures are always just a step away. This is precisely what his new album Walking Distance is about. Walking Distance is an exploration of musical unity — a journey through diverse genres that, despite their differences, remain deeply interconnected. The album blends elements of post-bop jazz, Arab music, Latin grooves, blues, funk, and the influences of Ghanaian music, resulting in a sonic reflection of the idea that cultural boundaries are far closer than they appear. They are, quite literally, just walking distance away. Drawing on this broad range of influences, the album’s pieces tell stories of everyday experiences: of being on the move in the bustle of life, of setting out and arriving, of universal actions that connect all people. This sense of “storytelling” once again proves to be one of Peter Somuah’s great strengths on Walking Distance, as it was on his previous albums. With a tone that is at times radiant, at times fragile, he takes listeners along on a deeply personal journey – from Ghana’s capital Accra with its vibrant highlife scene, via stations in Asia, all the way to Europe. The music is carried by the groove and vibe of Somuah’s multinational band, which he assembled in Rotterdam. The band, too, embodies the openness of its leader: the belief that all musicians, regardless of their background, are capable of playing any music in the world, provided they engage attentively and respectfully with its vocabulary and history. Peter Somuah explains: “I want listeners to feel both grounded and uplifted, reconnecting with themselves and the world around them through sound. Walking Distance represents my search between tradition and innovation. It’s a story of exploring the space between, finding unity in diversity, and using music as a bridge to bring us all closer together.” The way the 29-year-old does this is a reflection of his personality: assured, relaxed, sincere, fearless – and always with a smile.CreditsRecorded between 25 and 27 August 2025 at The Womb Studios, The Hague, NetherlandsRecorded by Tijmen van WageningenMixed by Anton de BruinMastered by Stuart HawkesProduced by Peter Somuah, Anton de BruinComposed by Peter Somuah

Marius Neset & Bergen Big Band: Time to LiveCD / digital Marius Neset tenor & soprano saxophonesAnton Eger drums & percussionBergen Big Band Norwegian saxophonist Marius Neset is one of the most virtuosic and musically complex players of our time—and a masterful composer and arranger for large ensembles, from orchestra to big band. His album Time to Live, recorded with the Bergen Big Band and drummer Anton Eger, reflects a guiding idea that runs consistently through Neset’s work: music as a source of strength and confidence in dark times. CreditsRecorded by Elaine Maltezos at Lungegårdens Kulturarena, Bergen, Norway, June 2022 Recording Assistant: Mathias Røyrvik Recording Producer: Martin Winter Mixed by August Wanngren at Virkeligheden Mastered by Sofia von Hage and Thomas Eberger at Stockholm Mastering Additional keyboards on #1, 2, 4 and 7: Morten Schantz Editing: Elaine Maltezos and Michael Barnes Artist photos by Helge Hansen, band photo by Stein Hødnebø Design by Jonas BoströmProduced by Marius Neset & Anton Eger All music composed and arranged by Marius Neset Cover photo by Helge Hansen

Mammal Hands: CircadiaCD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / Limited transparent vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Nick Smart pianoJordan Smart saxophoneRob Turner drums Mammal Hand stand at the forefront of a new generation of British musicians for whom jazz is above all a starting point for discovering their own means of expression. The piano/sax/drums trio blends elements of contemporary European jazz vocabulary with rock- and electronica-influenced rhythms and cinematic soundscapes. In doing so, they have succeeded in reaching an international audience that extends far beyond the jazz genre. The band’s sixth album, “Circadia,” marks a new stage of evolution in several ways: it is their first release on the ACT label, allowing them a new quality of visibility and musical freedom. And their first with a new drummer — Rob Turner, the long-time driving force behind British jazz success story GoGo Penguin.“The constants in Mammal Hands’ line-up are the brothers Nick Smart (piano) and Jordan Smart (saxophone). The departure of drummer Jesse Barrett in 2024 forced the two to reflect on what the core of the band really was. As a result, drummer Rob Turner became the new rhythmic backbone of the band. “We have known Rob since we all started out over a decade ago,” Nick Smart says. “We were all part of the UK jazz scene and we always connected over our shared musical instincts and interests. We had to rediscover the soul of our music and Rob has transformed it into something that continues our legacy as well as pushes it forward.” Rob joined the band for a forthcoming summer tour. “We spent time in the van on the road connecting over conversations about life and music and decided we should be working on a new record together once the shows were done,” Jordan says. “We took a musically open-ended approach, sending each other fragments of ideas that drew on the core tenets of the group: improvisation, intensity in the moment and ensuring the whole band moved together dynamically.”Decamping to east London’s Briggs Building for seven-hour shedding sessions once they were off the road, the reformed trio began honing the melodically-hypnotic sound that has become their signature since 2012’s debut Animalia while also injecting a new source of energy. “Myself and Jordan have been drawn to electronic music for a long time, while Rob was pulled towards the open-ended almost spiritual side of our improvisations,” Nick says. “Everything was egalitarian and empathetic in the room, being led by feelings and storytelling first. We would refine ideas until they reached their absolute essence.”The result is the enveloping nine tracks of Circadia. Moving from the intricate melodic freneticism and breakbeat rhythms of opener “Window To Your World” to the undulating harmonies of “Paper Boats”, cacophonic textural breakdowns of “Alia’s Abandon” and doom-laden overtone harmonics of “Submerge”, the album acts as a bridge back to the Mammal Hands sound as well as delving into heavier, often darker sonic territory. “Nick’s synth bass and Rob’s drumming really locked together, creating a new rhythmic foundation that runs through the whole record,” Jordan says. “The gloves were off and we felt free to push boundaries, which meant exploring more electronic and beat-influenced textures. It was like the ideas from all our different projects were coming full circle into Mammal Hands and forming part of a bigger cycle.”That sense of cyclical progression – like the circadian rhythm that gives the record its title – is equally reflected in the trio’s move from their previous label of Gondwana Records to ACT with this release. “Esbjörn Svensson Trio is one of my biggest influences so to release on ACT feels like coming home as well as starting something new at the same time,” Rob says. “It’s one of the most exciting highlights of my career.”For Nick and Jordan, the transition also marks an era of creative freedom. “There was no pre-conceived idea of how we should sound, no baggage,” Jordan says. “It feels like an open space for people to listen to what we’re doing and for us to engage in all our influences, from jazz to neoclassical, folk, post-rock and beyond.” Freewheeling yet tethered to their storied history, coming full circle to renew a relationship while drawing on decades of experience, the new phase of Mammal Hands has only just begun. CreditsRecorded March 20th to March 24th 2025 at Giant Wafer Studios, WalesRecorded by Ben CappMixed by Ben Capp Mastered by Shawn JosephComposed by Mammal HandsProduced by Mammal Hands and Ben CappCover Art by Cecily Eno

Nils Landgren: Love of My Life CD / Double vinyl (2xLP, 180g) / limited red transparent double vinyl (2xLP, 180g) / digital  Nils Landgren vocals, tromboneThe Swedish Radio Symphony OrchestraUlf Forsberg concertmasterJoel Lyssarides pianoLars Danielsson bassRobert Ikiz drumsIda Sand vocals on #1, 4, 9, 10, 11, piano on #4 Nils Landgren’s 70th birthday is approaching – it will be on 15 February 2026 – and that provides a moment to reflect not only on the scale of his achievement, but also the astonishingly wide range of roles which his life in music has involved. He is one of the most successful European jazz musicians of the past few decades. He is not just a trombonist and singer but also a festival director, mentor, promoter, producer and builder of bridges. He has been awarded of the German Cross of Merit, the Sir George Martin Music Award and the Litteris et Artibus medal, the highest order for art and culture which the Swedish royal family can bestow. He is a tirelessly hard worker, playing up to 200 concerts in peak years. But perhaps most importantly, it is in his nature to be both optimistic and huge-hearted. Everything Nils Landgren does is imbued with love, whether it is for music, for his signature instrument – the red trombone – for the people alongside him on the stage or for those gathered together in front it...And also for his wife the actress Beatrice Järås to whom he has been married for 48 years. What all of this means is that the title of his latest album could not be more apt: ‘Love of My Life’.“When I was young, I wanted to be a pop star... but one playing the trombone. Everyone told me: just forget it, take your place at the back of the orchestra. But that was something I could never have accepted.” Recorded with a band made up of close friends, plus the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, playing opulent arrangements by seven-time Grammy winner Vince Mendoza, Nils Landgren’s new album casts its net wide, from touching original compositions to songs by Cat Stevens, Leonard Bernstein, Kurt Weill, Herbie Hancock and also colleagues with whom he has worked such as Joe Sample and Ida Sand. This wide-ranging repertoire bears testament to Landgren’s remarkable capacity to bring all kinds of people together, to unite them and make things happen. “The most important thing in music for me is: no pigeonholing. It's always better to explore together a bit, to try to do some new things...”As is so often the case with Nils Landgren, ‘Love of My Life’ also has something of the character of a musical family enterprise: he is accompanied by Sweden's rising piano star Joel Lyssarides, double bass icon Lars Danielsson, drummer Robert Ikiz – also a permanent member of the Nils Landgren Funk Unit – and singer and long-time companion Ida Sand. For Nils Landgren, this is a lifelong dream come true. In the liner notes to the album, he writes: “Basically, I'm still the boy from the small Swedish ironworks town of Degerfors. I still can't quite believe that I have been invited to make music with an entire symphony orchestra and some of my best friends.” Anyone who knows Nils Landgren or has seen him live will know that this statement has absolutely no false modesty about it; it is totally genuine. “Many people say I'm down-to-earth. Even a small mount of fame can make things go completely wrong... My father told me: don't elevate yourself above others. Keep your feet on the ground. That's a very Swedish, Nordic attitude – you should never believe that you are better than others.” Nils Landgren is exactly the same person onstage that he is away from it. After every concert, he takes the time to talk to each and every visitor, hug them, take photos, sign albums, sometimes for a few hours. He says: “I am strongly motivated to meet the audience. It gives you an incredible amount of energy.” That's why, he says, he doesn't have any hobbies. When he's at home in the small village of Skillinge in southern Sweden, right by the sea, he likes to spend time with his wife Bea and practise the trombone in a wooden hut specially set up for this purpose, where his countless awards are also displayed. He also enjoys swimming in the Baltic Sea, even when the temperature is below ten degrees.“I have no need of bungee jumping or extreme sports – every time I go on stage, it's like free climbing. That's quite enough for me.”And that is why the Nils70 birthday concerts are likely to feel so much like family celebrations: Kicking off on 14 February at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg with his band, the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra and the ‘Love Of My Life’ programme, and then on 5 May at the Berlin Philharmonic – together with close friends such as Michael Wollny, Wolfgang Haffner, China Moses, Viktoria Tolstoy, members of the Berlin Philharmonic and many more. And actually, the whole of 2026 will be Nils Landgren Year: together with renowned regional orchestras, Nils Landgren will bring the ‘Love Of My Life’ programme to some of the most beautiful concert halls throughout Germany. “I usually meet orchestras for rehearsals just the day before the concert. Most of the time, it's just me and my trio – there's not even a conductor. As always in jazz, it's all about communication. I hope that the orchestral musicians understand my ideas... and if not, then I'll just have to try to convince them.” Pianist Michael Wollny once said that ‘with Nils, everything becomes easy.’ Landgren – it seems, at least in music – has no problems, no fears, there are only ever new opportunities to create something beautiful, perhaps even something magical in the moment. Behind this is a deep belief in goodness – not only the good in music, but also in people. And being convinced that the individual can be effective in a world where one can quickly feel lost and powerless. “Seeing things positively gives you so much more strength to carry on,” says Nils Landgren. “And the love which you receive as a result can then be passed on... and then you find that even more has been added when it comes back...” CreditsAll orchestra arrangements by Vince Mendoza – except Waiting (by Magnus Lindgren)Recorded live at Berwaldhallen, Stockholm — September 2024 & August 2025Recording engineer: Ulf ÖstlingFOH: Jan UgandProduced by Jan B. LarssonExecutive producers: Nils Landgren & Andreas BrandisPhotography: Nikola StankovicCover art by Martin NoelDesign by Siggi Loch

Vision String Quartet: in the fields CD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Florian Willeitner violinDaniel Stoll violinLeonard Disselhorst celloSander Stuart viola Five years on from their last album, vision string quartet are back, and they’re on stupendous form. ‘In the Fields’, their debut on ACT, is a brilliant demonstration of new worlds opening up to the musically curious, and also a statement of how astonishingly versatile a modern string quartet as good as this one can be. This Berlin-based ensemble - Florian Willeitner (violin), Daniel Stoll (violin), Sander Stuart (viola) and Leonard Disselhorst (cello) - has established itself in recent years as the ‘string quartet of the future’ (Sydney Morning Herald) and is known for its way of traversing between classical music, folk, jazz and new and original compositions. The release is also significant in the context of the ACT label, marking a further step beyond the world of jazz. ACT CEO Andreas Brandis comments on the collaboration: "My connection with the Vision String Quartet goes back many years – it began with the Concerto.21 masterclasses that I lead, and has continued through my close collaboration with the quartet’s first violinist Florian Willeitner. In the future, ACT will open up even more to connections between classical music, contemporary music and improvisation – and Vision String Quartet is an excellent example of this new pathway."The new album is a journey in sound, with a consistent dramaturgy from start to finish. Its shape and structure are based on Béla Bartók's five-movement String Quartet No. 4. For the members of the quartet, Bartók, who found his inspiration ‘in the fields’ and in the folk music of Europe, is their point of departure and their guiding figure. “We were infected by his fascination with what is familiar but also unknown,” the musicians explain, inviting listeners to dive with them into the depths of this music.The opening track, ‘Kopanitsa’, a Bulgarian folk song in 11/8 time, already reveals the earthiness and rhythmic fire that pervades the album. In the booklet, the quartet also refer to this introduction to the new recording as the ‘first movement of our work’. Florian Willeitner heard the piece played by a bagpipe player on the streets of Sofia – authenticity and the simple joy of playing are the order of the day here. This is followed by the second movement from the string quartet in F major by Ravel, an evergreen of the quartet repertoire, to which Willeitner and pianist Joel Lyssarides add a post-impressionistic sound world in ‘Ravel Reloaded’. Bartók's String Quartet No. 4 is the centrepiece of the album: its movements are not only interpreted classically, but also expanded in collaboration with Austrian percussionist Bernhard Schimpelsberger to include a ‘percussive dimension’ that opens up new dimensions for the listener. The musicians describe the experience of playing this work in 13 concerts on their 2023 tour of Australia as a “living in a compositional dream”; living and breathing a work until it became a part of them.In addition to working with Schimpelsberger, the vision players have had many exciting and inspiring encounters and collaborations with other musicians on their numerous concert tours around the world. For ‘In the Fields’, they composed and recorded pieces together with Iranian guitarist Mahan Mirarab and Swedish pianist Joel Lyssarides. These original compositions and arrangements provide the chance to hear further surprises. ‘Lydian Rose’ celebrates the colourfulness of the Lydian mode, “Raindance” allows plucked melodies to dance in the rain, and ‘Convalescence’ by Mahan Mirarab, written during the pandemic, is a wild ride between poetic gentleness and unremitting drive. The final ‘Skymning’ by Lyssarides is a gently flowing folk song that lingers in the ear. The vision string quartet remain true to their approach of performing as a band, playing the classical repertoire from memory and standing up – a trademark “that means maximum freedom and liveliness for us,” Willeitner explains. The group’s concert formats are equally innovative: dark concerts, cross-genre projects and collaborations with artists such as Fatma Said, Gabriel Kahane and Golnar Shahyar - all are demonstrations of the quartet's versatility.  It is definitely worth coming out of shuffle mode, and listening to this album straight through from start to finish in its intended order. That allows a true appreciation of the thoughtful interplay and contrast between the quartet movements by Bartók, Ravel and Dvořák and the quartet's own compositions. Heard like this, the dramaturgy and the utterly convincing shape of the album can unfold as intended, in all their depth. Together with their extraordinary guests, the four musicians on ‘In the Fields’ have demonstrated with complete conviction what the string quartet in the 21st century can be: packed with life, driven by curiosity, a place where the possibilities are limitless. CreditsRecorded between 7–12 October 2024 and 29–30 October 2024 at Studio 1,BR Franken, NürnbergProduced by vision string quartetExecutive producer for BR: Beate SampsonRecording producer, engineer, editing, mixing: Christian JaegerRecording and editing technician: Tatjana SchewtschenkoPiano tuner: Theo KretzschmarMastered by Christoph Stickel, Vienna Cover photo by Sander Stuart

Viktoria Tolstoy & Jacob Karlzon: Who We AreCD / Vinyl (LP, 180g) / digital  Viktoria Tolstoy vocalsJacob Karlzon piano, keyboards, programmingVocalist Viktoria Tolstoy and pianist/keyboard player Jacob Karlzon have worked together as close musical companions and friends for nearly three decades. So, when they choose to call their album Who We Are, it is far more than just an album title: they are making a statement. What they are offering is a kind of musical self-portrait. They are aggregating and celebrating their shared experience and their mutual trust. Theirs is the kind of artistic language which only emerges after two people have been resonating on the same frequency for years. This duo’s journey began in the mid-1990s during one of Tolstoy’s UK tours. Since then they have performed together again and again, recorded six albums together, including Letter To Herbie (2011), a homage to Herbie Hancock, an idol for both of them, and A Moment of Now (2013) the first of their widely acclaimed duo recordings.Viktoria Tolstoy and Jacob Karlzon’s close collaboration has reached the point where their story is no longer something they keep on needing to reinvent – these days they can simply tell it. Tolstoy describes in their interplay they have all the benefit of freedom, while also feeling completely secure: “What we do as a duo is really demanding – but it feels effortless. Jacob speaks my language completely; we follow and complement each other in a magical way.” This strong connection enables the duo to take constant risks, both in the studio and on stage – an essential part of who they are. Karlzon experiences this bond similarly: “Between Viktoria and me, there is no division between soloist and accompanist; we are simply two kindred spirits and we work on a completely equal footing.” This close communication forms the basis of the album – and perhaps the most precise answer to the title: Who We Are is that is a state of being. A mutual understanding. An authentic musical expression of “We”.Karlzon uses a vivid metaphor to help explain this phenomenon. He notes that the songwriters whose work the duo interprets – Billy Joel, Tori Amos, Thom Yorke – are artists who both sing and play the piano. “In a way, that’s exactly what we are trying to do – except we do it as two people. Two individuals, but one musical organism.” This idea – finding expression which is two-voiced but also unified – runs like a uniting thread through the entire production. Who We Are often sounds on a bigger scale than a duo because Tolstoy’s soul-infused jazz vocals and Karlzon’s energetic, harmonically wide-ranging playing do not merely complement each other – they merge. Alongside distinctive interpretations of songs by iconic songwriters, Who We Are also features a number of original compositions by Jacob Karlzon. On this occasion, and for the first time he has contributed not just the music but also written all the lyrics. Tolstoy, remembers being both surprised and deeply moved when she witnessed Karlzon taking this step: “After I’d received the music, suddenly lyrics for one song after another would begin landing in my inbox – and I was completely lost for words, they were so good!” Karlzon describes the writing process as a return to what he feels is at the root of all art: it’s not about a concept or aiming for commercial viability, but all about being truthful. The lyrics reflect personal experiences as well as observations – a patchwork that nonetheless carries a clear sense of purpose. Tolstoy, in turn, transforms these songs into her own stories. Because she knows Karlzon so well, as she says: “These are words that I can feel. Because I know exactly where they come from.”Who We Are is a mature, warm, and self-assured album by two artists who know each other in all their complexity – and through that, have found the kind of freedom that is increasingly rare. They have produced a collection of work which isn’t trying to explain who they might like to be; it lets us understand who they truly are.CreditsRecorded at Musikaliska Kvarteret, Stockholm, August 25 & 26, 2025, by Lars NilssonAdditional recordings at ChassRoomMixed and mastered at Nilento Studio by Lars NilssonNilento team: Lars Nilsson, Michael Dalvid, and Jenny NilssonProduced by Jacob Karlzon & Lars NilssonJacob Karlzon is a Steinway Artist

iiro Rantala Trio - TrinityCD / Limited and Hand-Numbered Deluxe Vinyl Box / digital“A charming, grand performance and one of the best albums of this year. Exceedingly highly recommended.” The Ear / GB For the third edition of the exclusive collaboration between ACT and the renowned “Château Palmer,” Finnish master pianist Iiro Rantala dedicates himself to his love for the great jazz standards. For this project, he and producer Andreas Brandis assembled a new trio featuring Finnish, New York-based bassist Kaisa Mäensivu and Danish drummer Morten Lund. You can hear the magic of the historic château in Bordeaux in these recordings — sometimes tender and melodic, sometimes intensely swinging.Also available as strictly limited “EDITION PALMER III”High-quality, linen-covered box180-gram vinyl Hand-signed art print by Katja Strunz Extensive LP-sized booklet Hi-res download card iiro Rantala piano Kaisa Mäensivu double bass Morten Lund drums "Trinity" Text by Alex Dutilh, Open Jazz Translated by Sebastian Scotney2+2=3. The idea is mischievous, but maybe when a trio of musicians as good as these conspire together to make something very unusual, the breaking of rules is going to happen anyway. iiro Rantala and Morten Lund have known each other ever since the pianist joined the ACT family. Back then, in 2012, iiro called out to the Danish drummer to record ‘My History of Jazz’ with him. "Since then, I've become more convinced than ever that Morten really is the best in Europe at playing alongside a walking bass. And there’s a simple reason for that: he is steeped in Copenhagen’s long and illustrious jazz tradition. He has worked alongside the players who performed with Dexter Gordon, Stan Getz and Ben Webster, with Ed Thigpen, with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, pretty much everyone...he has inherited all of that history. " As regards the double bassist on this album, Kaisa met iiro at a jam session in Helsinki during Covid. Despite her being based in New York, the pianist recently hired her to celebrate Independence Day with him at the Finnish President’s residence in Helsinki, Mäntyniemi, in December 2024. "Morten, Kaisa and I had never actually played together before the Château Palmer gig. And I had never recorded an album of standards with a trio of piano, double bass and drums,” explains the pianist. “The usual way is to rehearse... then to play a few concerts or even a tour... we normally put ourselves to the test before we record. Not this time."That wish, to capture and preserve the freshness and wonder of things being done for the very first time is in the DNA of the Edition Palmer Collection, a superb initiative conceived and co-led by Thomas Duroux, director of Château Palmer, and Andreas Brandis, CEO and producer at ACT, with ‘Trinity’ as the third in the series. In 2023, the inaugural meeting between Joachim Kühn and Michael Wollny (‘Duo’) was very much a one-off encounter, and that set the tone. The emphasis in this series is on having the expectation that each ‘millésime’ will be resolutely, definingly unique... In 2024, the recording at the Château of Lars Danielsson's Trio with Verneri Pohjola and John Parricelli was also the result of following an intuition that the combination would be miraculous... all of this is very much aligned with Château Palmer’s way of making wine, which is to vary the proportions of Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Petit Verdot in the blend of each year’s vintage. For this trio, iiro has opted for a repertoire of standards. This is a first for him, and in two respects. "I had been thinking about doing it for many years. I felt that at some point in my life, I had to pay tribute to this repertoire, which represents the foundations. Like a classical musician who must one day tackle the toccatas of Bach's or the sonatas of Mozart and Beethoven. That said, I think that jazz pianists as a rule are better off not starting from there. Because there is such a weight of expectation from those who came before: Bill Evans, Oscar Peterson, Keith Jarrett... But one thing is certain. I wanted to approach the standards without arranging them or, more importantly, without deranging them, without the obsession of wanting to reharmonise them or feeling any need to transform a waltz into 5/4... I wanted it all to be as pared-down as possible, to approach them in the purest way we could." To make this intent even clearer, iiro chose not to seek out rare or forgotten standards, but to revisit some of the best-known ones. He stays as close as possible to their essence, allowing the listener to hear the ‘specific touch’ he brings to them... in the same way that a great wine strives to reveal the truth of its ‘terroir’. Alongside the Broadway classics, Rantala has smuggled in two sly acknowledgements of the French popular heritage. First, there is Hymne à l'amour, immortalised by Edith Piaf in 1950; second, the oldest lullaby known in France, Fais Dodo, Colas Mon P’tit Frère do, which dates back to the 18th century and has a melody which incorporates the sound of church bells ringing the Angelus. Every toddler remembers it, whether they live in the Médoc, Burgundy or Languedoc, so it's a particularly delightful moment when this lullaby is performed as a duet by iiro and Kaisa. It is also noteworthy that when the bassist recorded this, she was expecting a child... her pregnancy bump nestling against the double bass. A lullaby, then, which also embodies an annunciation. iiro is one of those musicians who – quite literally – has the lyrics of all of the standards he plays at his fingertips. So, the fact that the journey takes us from the cheerful I Love You to the tenderness of Smile says a lot about the atmosphere of the session: it was one in which a huge sense of empathy prevailed. Between the three musicians, there is a heightened sense of mutual listening, not least because there is no scope for patching, hiding away or trickery in this studio set-up: all three musicians are in the same room, a ‘salon’ on the ground floor of the Château. And their eyes are as wide open as their ears. Arnaud Houpert, the sound engineer, has installed a transparent screen in front of the drums and double bass to keep their sounds away from the piano microphones. The music is therefore captured as close as possible to the natural sound of three musicians making music ‘together’. And that brings a musical echo here of Palmer's biodynamic approach to winegrowing. In terms of closeness to nature, the recording venue took things even further, as the living room's French windows let in daylight and views of the landscape. Morten, Kaisa and iiro would all readily admit later that they were greatly inspired by the clouds, the blue sky and a breeze blowing through the trees as they improvised. Another indication of this trio’s natural and empathetic teamwork during their two days in the studio was that they never needed to go beyond three takes for any of the standards, and, in the case of four of them, the first take was the best, and the one used on the album. It must be said that as artistic director, Andreas Brandis, who was in the next room with the sound engineer, made the decisions with his very keen ear, discussing with iiro whether a particular take might need redoing, or if the magic had simply taken hold straight away. During one of the breaks, Andreas spoke of the respect he has for Thomas Duroux, the director of Château Palmer, with whom a long-standing partnership has been established. "Most of the other châteaux in the Médoc have classical music programmes, because it makes sense to have a violinist or solo pianist in a place associated with great wines. Jazz, with its adventurous side, is something very different. But Thomas Duroux, with his idea of combining his own passion for jazz with the world of wine, strikes a chord, and that's a stroke of luck. He tries to innovate in his holistic view of the relationship between the vineyard and its environment, which, I suppose, is not always the most obvious option. But, as in jazz, the most direct path is rarely the most interesting." In the same way as a new perspective on the trio comes from the insertion of the track for the duo of piano and double bass, a solo piano gem has also been cleverly slipped in, rather like a less common grape varietal which adds depth to the classic blend of a vintage. Iiro chose In a Sentimental Mood at the very end of the second session. And it would have been wrong for him to deprive us of it. We hear five minutes in which the pianist's truth creeps in beneath the melody – playing with a touch of bewildering grace. It takes complete maturity to dare such simplicity, to just let the fingers do the singing.Another memorable moment comes with the rhythm which Morten Lund has chosen for The Days of Wine and Roses. It might have brought a glimmer of approval to Ahmad Jamal (who never recorded the tune), remembering the days of his classic trio with Vernell Fournier and Israel Crosby. The energy in Lund’s drumming is a tonic, and it has more than a hint of tannic spice about it too. Perhaps that’s no accident, because Morten Lund is a devoted wine connoisseur and collector. His playing is in perfect sympathy with Kaisa Mäensivu's walking bass throughout the session. Kaisa now lives in New York, where she has formed a band to playing her own original music. "It was so nice to go back to the standards," she admits with a smile. "I found it enjoyable to be so free, because I usually play quite complex or difficult music. And here, suddenly, it all fits on one page, with simple chord changes, and you feel really free. It becomes a real playground." For Morten, this repertoire is more like a second skin: "It's quite natural in Copenhagen. First you have to get your ‘jazz licence’ by playing standards. It was and still is the way to get on the scene, get noticed and get gigs. I was deeply inspired by this tradition, which was, and still is, very strong in Denmark. Having learned from Alex Riel and Ed Thigpen, I have the standards in my blood." iiro, Kaisa and Morten share a commitment to communicate these standards as they really are, as if turning the pages of a short story with each one. The three have done the music a great service, by allowing these songs to sing, to breathe, to be both deeply felt and truly heard. This trilogy, just like its counterpart in wine, is best savoured slowly, one little sip at a time. These are songs which have not just stood the test of time; there is also something timeless about them.CreditsRecorded at Château Palmer in Margaux-Cantenac, France, May 19–22, 2025Recorded by Arnaud HoupertMixed and mastered by Klaus ScheuermannProduced by Andreas BrandisCover art © Katja Strunz Unfolding Process (2025) Courtesy of Contemporary Fine ArtsDesign by Siggi Loch

Theo Croker and Sullivan FortnerCD / Vinyl / Limited Green Vinyl / digital Theo Croker trumpetSullivan Fortner piano Forget the boxes.Forget the compositions.Forget the market.Forget if people will get it.Forget everything. Let's just PLAY. The album PLAY unites for the first time two of the most important American musicians of the current generation charting new paths in jazz & way beyond: trumpeter Theo Croker and pianist Sullivan Fortner. The two have known each other for more than 20 years, but PLAY is their first recording as joint leaders. Their original idea was to record a collection of modern jazz standards, perhaps including a few versions of popular songs. So Croker and Fortner went into the studio, made a recording… but then discarded it. In its entirety. Theo Croker remembers: ‘As we were playing it, it felt very stale. Not in the sense that the songs weren't any good. But it felt like we were just kind of playing things that had already been recorded many times.’ Sullivan Fortner agrees: ‘We felt it wasn't really us, it felt more like being in school. We had both played a lot of music from the great American songbook in the past. Those are great songs, they were our vehicle for studying. But it wasn't necessarily the music we gravitated towards on gigs. We are always rooted in something that is beyond just jazz. The music we create always tends to reflect the entire diaspora of black American music, as opposed to just one solid genre.”So Croker and Fortner went back into the studio... the very next day. The plan this time: no plan. No compositions (except for the opener A Prayer for Peace). Let’s just PLAY. Theo Croker takes up the story: “We would just come up with spontaneous little ideas: This song we’ll play fast. For this song we pick four notes we were NOT gonna play. This song I play long notes, you play fast notes. I'm gonna come up with a melody and we just see where it goes. In just one hour, we were done.” The process might sound simple in theory, but in reality it has captured the essence of two lifetimes of learning and improvisation. Sullivan Fortner says: “It just felt right, it felt like: this is really us. It pulled inspirationally and spiritually and pulled out a lot of the things we have learned together and in common.” This extraordinary recording, now being released on ACT has an interesting backstory: Theo Croker has already appeared on ACT as the mainstay of quite a few previous releases: first was Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic XII – Sketches of Miles (recorded in 2021) and then Emile Parisien’s transatlantic project Louise (2022), first in the studio and then live. As a result, ACT CEO Andreas Brandis proposed to the trumpeter that he might release a more acoustic, chamber music-influenced album – something very different from his work as a leader, which tends to inhabit the borderlands between jazz, hip hop and pop. Croker’s first instinctive reaction to the suggestion was positive, and to offer a duo recording with Sullivan Fortner. It was an idea which the two musicians had already been considering for a long time. PLAY is one of those unusual occasions when everything has fallen into place. In today’s music business, that’s not just rare, it’s a miracle. No rulebook, no questions about genres, no aiming at target groups...or singles...or suitability for streaming. Just the music. Even though a wide variety of influences have coalesced here, the album has a particularly emblematic and vivid statement to make about what the spirit of jazz is: freedom, interaction, the opportunity to express oneself without restriction and to communicate with one another. Or, as Sullivan Fortner puts it: ‘This is just two brothers playing.’ Credits#1 composed by Theo Croker, all other tracks are improvisationsRecorded June 6, 2023 at The Bunker Studio, Brooklyn, NYRecorded by Todd CarterMixed by Todd CarderMastered by Klaus ScheuermannProduced by Theo Croker & Sullivan FortnerPhoto by @ogata_photoSpiral motif used under license from Giorgio Morara Alamy (vector graphic)Cover design by Siggi Loch

Dhafer Youssef - ShirazCD / Vinyl / digital Dhafer Youssef oud, vocalsDaniel García Diego pianoMario Rom trumpetSwaeli Mbappe electric bassTao Ehrlich drumsNguyên Lê electric guitar, sound design (#4,10,11,13) There is no mistaking the deep emotions running through Dhafer Youssef's first album as leader on the ACT label, Shiraz. Feelings of love and gratitude on his part are unmistakably present, but he also imbues them with both light and darkness. The Tunisian oud master/vocalist’s pieces have a particular intimacy about them, and noticeably more so than in his previous work – because the story he has to tell here is certainly the most personal of his entire career. The album carries an explicit dedication to his wife Shiraz Fradi. It is about their close relationship and the eventful, at times bittersweet journey which they have shared since being together. Dhafer Youssef is widely regarded as one of the most distinctive musical voices of our time; his art transcends borders, languages, and genres. Already as a child in his native Tunisia, he became acquainted with the Sufi tradition of Islamic music. Most of it was about love, a mystical understanding of human existence and the spirituality behind reality. These themes aroused his curiosity, but it was not long before a place such as Teboulbá in the Sahel region proved too restricting for a young man whose mind was set on seeing more of the world. In 1990, Dhafer Youssef left Tunisia, ending up in Vienna where he initially managed to keep the wolf from the door by cleaning windows, washing dishes, and working as a waiter.. He started carefully networking, and a theatre group brought him into contact with local musicians… What marked him out above all as a musician was that he had such a clear idea of how his music should sound: rooted in the traditions of Arabic music and Sufism, yet open to contemporary sounds – and these could come from a variety of sources: jazz, chamber music, rock or even electronic music. With these ideas and this vision, the newcomer quickly found his niche. It was not long before top musicians such as Christian Muthspiel, Renaud Garcia-Fons and Markus Stockhausen were playing in his bands. From then on, his progress was rapid, the venues became larger, the projects more ambitious. In addition to European colleagues such as Eivind Aarset, American greats such as Marcus Miller and Herbie Hancock were soon to join the fray. Dhafer Youssef's first contact with ACT came in 2006 on Nguyên Lê's hypnotic and many-hued album Homescape.However, the most important event in Dhafer Youssef's recent past didn’t have to do with music, at least not in the first place: at the end of the noughties, he met Tunisian filmmaker and director Shiraz Fradi – an encounter that, as he says, turned his life on its head. The two became a couple. The oud master, who had hitherto been restless in the extreme became much more grounded and centered. Things were going well until the coronavirus pandemic stopped everything in its tracks. And it was Shiraz and her view of the world that helped Dhafer Youssef to maintain his creativity during this time. He reflects: “Shiraz is a sensitive filmmaker, she sees life as cinema as if my days were transformed into endless scenes, and I was condemned, or perhaps blessed, to compose music without pause. Music, film, writing…they became the rhythm of our everyday life.” Just after Covid, life changed once again - unexpectedly and dramatically - as Dhafer Youssef recalls: “Shiraz was diagnosed with cancer. But when faced with this reality, she rejected the word fight. Instead, she said: I embrace this new journey. And she walked through it with a grace and resilience that continues to inspire me.” Yet this period also proved to be an enormous challenge: “The third chemotherapy session was a moment I can never erase. I entered the room: Shiraz’ body was there, but her soul had drifted elsewhere. I looked at her; she did not look back. She was crying, and I was helpless, clueless. Only music could reach her, soothe her, bring her back to us. And I understood: my next album could bear only one name: Shiraz. For her, I could write entire books - about the doors she opened, about the light she brought. But here, I simply want to celebrate her: her journey, her grace.” Recorded with a band of younger musicians – pianist Daniel García, trumpeter Mario Rom, bassist Swaéli Mbappé, drummer Tao Ehrlich, and guest guitarist Nguyên Lê – the nine pieces of the album trace the emotions Dhafer Youssef experienced. “The music reflects what Shiraz thinks and hears,” he explains. Generalife Gardens, for example, recalls the flamenco duo Lole y Manuel from their time in Spain. Other tracks, like The Epistle Of Love, evolve from gentle intros to joyful finales - films for the ears rather than the eyes. Listeners will notice changes during the second half of the album: the oud takes on the intimacy of chamber music, Dhafer Youssef's voice gains prominence - hymnic in Shajan, tender in Rose Fragrance, eruptive in Eyeblink And Eternity. Besides the very personal story behind Shiraz, the music of the album, and of Dhafer Youssef in general has a cultural relevance that might be more important today as ever before: It embodies the dialogue between heritage and modernity. In an era marked by division and noise, his music offers connection, silence, and transcendence. It reminds us that art can be a bridge between East and West, between the self and the collective. And it stands as a testimony that identity is not confinement but expansion, a celebration of multiplicity and unity. Credits All compositions and arrangements by Dhafer Youssef Recording by Tony Paeleman at Studio des Bruères, October 21 & 22, 2024Terpsichorean recorded in Paris March 28th by Giulio Gallo Mixing & additional recordings (vocal, oud) by Nguyên Lê at Big Rock Studio, Lyon (December 2024-June 2025) Mastered by Bruno Gruel at Elektra MasteringVisual Storyteller / Photographer: Skander Khlif Creative Director: Shiraz Fradi Cover art by Skander Khlif

Nils Landgren - Christmas with my Friends IXCD / Purple Vinyl / digital Nils Landgren trombone, vocalsSharon Dyall vocalsJeanette Köhn vocals Jessica Pilnäs vocals Ida Sand vocals, piano Jonas Knutsson saxophones Johan Norberg guitars Clas Lassbo bassTrombones from the Swedish Radio Symphony OrchestraHåkan Björkman, Mikael Oscarsson, James Kent, Martha Eikemo Andersen What would Christmas be without songs? And without friends and family? Trombonist, singer, and producer Nils Landgren had long dreamed of celebrating a musical Christmas with good friends. In 2006, this dream became reality: Christmas With My Friends was released and quickly became one of the most popular and successful Christmas albums in European jazz — and a beloved tradition. Since then, the series has appeared every two years, accompanied by regular tours. Now, with Christmas With My Friends IX, the series enters its ninth round.“Someone once asked me: is there not an end to Christmas songs?” recalls Nils Landgren. His answer is simple: “The answer is simple: no, there is not. As long as we celebrate Christmas, there will be songs celebrating the occasion in one way or the other.” For Landgren and his fellow musicians, both the recordings and the concerts are a special joy: “There is no way I can describe the feeling when another recording session is finished. We all put our heart and soul into each and every Christmas album we make, and over the years we have become a very tight bunch of people, and we know each other quite well by now — after 8 albums and 10 long tours over the past decades.” As in every edition, Landgren & Friends also gathered over coffee and cinnamon buns for the ninth installment of Christmas to discuss and try out a selection of classic European and American Christmas songs across styles and eras, as well as new compositions. The lineup once again features Jonas Knutsson (saxophone), Johan Norberg (guitar), Clas Lassbo (bass), and Ida Sand (piano, vocals), along with vocalists Sharon Dyall, Jessica Pilnäs, and Jeanette Köhn. Traditionally, the recordings took place at the renowned Atlantis Studios in Stockholm – under the direction of Nils Landgren and co-producer Johan Norberg. As a special treat this time, Landgren invited the trombone section of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra to perform on some particularly moving chorales. The variety of voices, the close familiarity among all the musicians, and the warm, acoustic character – both festive and intimate – shape the unmistakable charm of this music. Christmas With My Friends IX is a celebration of friendship, peace, and joy – a musical Christmas story that Nils Landgren and his friends share with their audience. Credits Recorded March 3–4, 2025, at Atlantis Studios, Stockholm Recorded by Niclas Lindström Trombones on #1 recorded by Hans Gardemar at KMH Kungasalen Stockholm Mixed by Johan Norberg Mastered by Klaus ScheuermannProduced by Nils Landgren & Johan Norberg

Emma Rawicz - INKYRACD / Vinyl / Limited Purple Vinyl / digitalEmma Rawicz tenor, soprano saxophonesGareth Lockrane flute, alto flute, bass flute, piccolo David Preston guitar Scottie Thompson Rhodes, piano, Prophet Kevin Glasgow electric bassJamie Murray drums‘In jazz, there’s always more to learn,’ says saxophonist Emma Rawicz. Since the release of her ACT debut album Chroma in August 2023, she has emerged as one of the most acclaimed and in-demand European jazz musicians of her generation. For Emma Rawicz, jazz is above all a never-ending source of creative inspiration. ‘There's always something new to discover,’ she says. ‘While you practise, there are so many new things which can be developed.’ Emma Rawicz sets herself a gruelling work schedule. During the coronavirus pandemic, she started documenting her practice routines on Instagram, which has led to tens of thousands of people keeping track of her development ever since. She tours throughout Europe, playing in major concert halls, headlining at important festivals, while also constantly writing new music. She leads her own Emma Rawicz Jazz Orchestra, and recently became a BBC New Generation Artist – joining the uniquely prestigious scheme through which the BBC supports ‘some of the world’s most promising new talent’, across several genres of music. As The Guardian has written: ‘Emma Rawicz hit the ground running – and the warp speed of her evolution is showing no sign of slowing.’Emma Rawicz is never one to seek out the easy paths, and her desire to challenge audiences is also something fundamental. And yet...she always does it with a smile. Confrontation doesn’t interest her, but rather the discovery and the experience of new music which has never previously been heard, and which can transcend everyday clichés. The album Inkyra, recorded with the sextet Gareth Lockrane (flute), David Preston (guitar), Scottie Thompson (keys), Kevin Glasgow (electric bass) and Jamie Murray (drums), breaks boundaries in many ways. It is completely alive with energy, ideas, colours and rhythmic and harmonic complexity. Rawicz herself impresses here, with a tone that is as weighty as it is agile, deep musical intellect paired with great sensuality and a feel for subtle nuances, and gradations of textures. Rawicz and her band tried out the new music for the first time in a small, standing-only London venue – and in front of a very diverse audience. There is something of a statement here: the first trial of new music is not about seeing how it will fit under the players’ fingers, but rather whether an audience can “get it” and be carried along by it, about whether the people in the room are going to be moved emotionally by the music – and are also going to move physically with it.‘This album means a lot to me. It's something special,’ says Rawicz about Inkyra. ‘I've been playing with this band for more than three years. We've worked very intensively on this music. After the first concert last summer, we all invested a lot of time, practised and developed the programme further in workshops. So everyone has left their mark on it.‘ The influences on the music come from many sources – including some you might not immediately expect: ‘Some of the inspiration for the music comes from Joni Mitchell. That might sound strange at first, because the pieces don't sound like singer/songwriter music. Nevertheless, I immersed myself in her music before composing the programme. I am fascinated by her way of structuring melodies, her use of harmony, unusual tunings and unfamiliar chords that you don't hear in jazz. That influenced me on the piano and in turn shaped my work as a composer. The result is a unique identity. I also took inspiration from the lyrics, which appear in the titles of the pieces and have also inspired the fantasy name of the album.’ “The music of Inkyra sounds at least as colorful as Rawicz’s ACT debut Chroma (from the Greek for colour and a nod to Emma Rawicz’s unique perception of sound and color as a synesthete). ”The anthemic intro, for example, has its roots in the spiritual sound of the sixties. There are dense, towering textures that reach into prog rock, as in Moondrawn (dreaming), or references to Brazilian rhythmic roots, as in Marshmallow Tree. Some tracks - Anima Rising for example sound like, as if not just a sextet but an entire jazz orchestra is playing; other parts – such as Time, And Other Thieves – sound like a mixture of heavy indie beat and shimmering psychedelia, especially thanks to Gareth Lockrane's expansive and authoritative flute playing. The album somehow brings to mind the image of a spaceship, one in which Emma Rawicz – who currently lives in Berlin having spent several years in London – is definitely heading in new directions: ‘Sometimes it felt like we were leaving orbit, boundless in our improvisations. Like we could just take off and leave the rest behind. For me, it's like a cosmic journey. We don't know where we're going to land – only that when we do, it will be together.’CreditsAll music composed by Emma RawiczProduced by Emma Rawicz, co-produced by David PrestonRecorded at Livingston Studios, on the 7th, 8th and 9th of October 2024Recorded by Sonny Johns Mixed by Alex KillpartrickMastered by Klaus ScheuermannCover art by Yukimasa Ida, Flowers (2022) © Yukimasa Ida, courtesy of Mariane Ibrahim Gallery

Bugge Wesseltoft - It's still snowing on my pianoLiveCD / Vinyl / Limited Sky Blue Vinyl / digital Bugge Wesseltoft pianoBugge Wesseltoft’s solo piano album It's Snowing On My Piano (1997) is one of the most successful albums that the ACT label has ever released. For many people – especially in Germany and Norway – this music, made with such care and love by the affable and generous-spirited Norwegian, has become an essential part of their holiday season. And yet, for a Christmas album, it is anything but typical. From the very first note, the meditative strength of the music is palpable. Wesseltoft creates a locus of peace and tranquillity – a state of being which seems even more precious today than it did when the album first appeared. In the intervening years, Bugge Wesseltoft has played the music from the album many times in concert. Each time, he reinterprets the music afresh, with the compositions and melodies serving as points of departure for musical meditations shaped in the moment. After almost 20 years of these performances, the time is now right to document and indeed to celebrate this aspect of Wesseltoft’s patient but continuing creative evolution through the release of It's still snowing on my piano. This new, live version of the much-loved album was recorded at five concerts in cultural centres and churches in Norway. When Bugge Wesseltoft played the music from Snowing live for the very first time almost 20 years ago at Kalkmølla, an intimate hall in a cultural centre outside Oslo, he had strong doubts as to whether it would be possible to recreate the magical atmosphere of the studio recording. He recalls: “There were about a hundred people seated in a small acoustic space. I started playing quietly and slowly, just like on the album. After a few songs, I started to hear deep breathing coming from somewhere in the audience. ‘Oh God, this must be so boring for them,’ I thought... I was sure they would all leave during the interval.” Of course, his fears were unfounded – not a single person left. In fact, quite the opposite: “After the concert, everyone told me what a great experience it had been. Since then, I have been playing this music every December in Norway in front of large audiences. It's incredible to feel the collective energy that this music and the presence of an audience in a concert hall can create together.” When Siggi Loch, the founder of ACT, originally suggested that Wesseltoft might record a Christmas album in 1997, the pianist was initially less than enthusiastic. He can still remember why: “I'm not a big fan of the frenzy of Christmas shopping, all that enforced happiness...In the early nineties I worked in a psychiatric clinic and was shocked to discover that Christmas was a peak season for depression, nervous breakdowns and family problems. I counted myself lucky, because I grew up in a family where Christmas Eve was a heart-warming, peaceful evening spent with my closest family." This eventually inspired Wesseltoft to record a Christmas album in this spirit — one that his then two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Maren might one day come to love: "Calm, slow, with an emphasis on fond childhood memories, on the songs we sang while holding hands around the Christmas tree," as he describes it. There was no particular reason to expect that the recording would do well when it was released before Christmas 1997. And at first, not much happened at all. But in the following year, word spread about this very special Christmas music, people took the album to their hearts, recommended it and gave it as a gift again and again, something which continues right up to the present day. The live recording It's still snowing on my piano feels familiar – but at the same time it is new. The melodies of the compositions, originals but in traditional vein, remain intact. Wesseltoft's approach to the songs is neither of deconstruction nor of recomposition, but rather one of gently wandering and exploring the spaces between the notes. And yet it is precisely in this way that completely new music emerges within the songs. It seems as if each preceding note is paving the way for the next, as if each new twist and turn leads on to another. It can often seem that Wesseltoft himself is both player and listener. During the recording of the original album, his daughter Maren sat on his lap – not a typical artist-audience relationship, but rather one of listening and feeling being shared. And that is the spirit which pervades Snowing whether it is heard in concert or at home. It is the ever-present feeling of connection between musician and listener that makes this evergreen music so completely magical. CreditsMusic arranged and produced by Bugge Wesseltoft Mixed and mastered by Klaus ScheuermannCover art by Ardy Strüwer

Bill Laurance - LumenCD / Vinyl / Limited turquoise Vinyl / digitalBill Laurance Yamaha CFX2 grand pianoYamaha UX3 upright piano with feltFor a couple of days and nights, Bill Laurance went into hiding. He locked himself away in a place where he could be alone at the piano, lost in music, could allow himself to drift, sometimes guided by existing compositions, sometimes less so. Around him the solid brick walls of St Faith's Church in Dulwich in South London provided a buffer from the outside world, creating a spiritual backdrop for the music. ‘I'm not a very religious person,’ recalls Laurance as he thinks back to the recording situation in early April of this year. ‘But it was special to play there while everyday life was on hold. And it's different when you're in that kind of setting, just communicating with yourself. I wanted to capture the freedom in music that arises at moments like that.’With his latest solo recording, Bill Laurance, who often experiments with acoustic and electric sounds, is passionate about exploring the full sonic and musical spectrum of an accoustic concert grand piano - and to inhabit the realm between composition and freedom: "When you play solo, you have a unique opportunity to explore that. Recording in a church was the perfect setting and let me fully surrenders to the music. The superb guitarist Isaiah Sharkey once said to me that it’s the music itself which tells him what to play. That idea really left its mark on me. We are usually trained to control everything, to practice until it’s perfect. But I think I've got to a point where I just want to let it flow. Do the opposite, let the music take the lead." It would be wrong, however, to infer that Bill Laurance has suddenly thrown away the rulebook completely. Whereas many pieces on ‘Lumen’ have a strong improvisational component, others are composed and have clearly defined structures. The 44-year-old pianist, composer and bandleader is not interested in heading in the direction of resolution and completion, but rather in the power that arises from contrast. He has several projects in which he communicates extensively with musical partners. For example, in the duo with Michael League, in his own trio, with Snarky Puppy, or his orchestral collaborations such as “Bloom” with The Untold Orchestra. These are situations in which one becomes part of a greater entity, and can be carried forwards by the flow, the teamwork. Solo piano, on the other hand, works very differently. You see yourself in the mirror, set the rules – but can also break away from them: "I really immersed myself in the moment. For me, it felt like a solo pilgrimage. Something happened, I recorded about three hours of music in total and then had to decide which bits to leave out. At its core, however, it was a spiritual experience for me, a process of arriving, a question of trust. A bit like Indiana Jones in “The Last Crusade” when he takes that jump into the abyss – a leap into the unknown. I couldn't have exposed more of who I am than I did with this music. I used to be surrounded by a load of synthesizers, drum machines, all kinds of things, even when I was playing solo. But as an artist, I now feel ready to leave all that behind me, the idea here is to be more organic, pure, direct." As well as the conventional grand piano, Bill Laurance also used a piano with felt dampers, at the opposite end of the scale from the big resonance of the grand piano. With the felt dampeners, the attack of the piano is reduced allowing for a more inviting and intimate tone. The “felted piano” is tonal, melodic percussion and a contrast with the large, more public space which the church offered. He used it discreetly to give the ten pieces of ‘Lumen’ additional colour, for example as the melodically bold and dramatic intro to ‘Mantra,’ which gradually and almost imperceptibly transitions from a tiny motif into the full opulent sound of the grand piano. The title track, on the other hand, has an impressionistic character and seems like a newly discovered prelude, while ‘Dove’ becomes a version of modern stride piano with lots of cheerful interplay, but also a bluesy nonchalance. The album ‘Lumen’ opens doors into a vast world of imagination. It feels like just the captivating beginning, in which the chance to explore and to dig into his heritage and into himself has led Bill Laurance to create music which is grounded in melody, but also lives and breathes the allure of freedom. And it makes you want to accompany Bill Laurance on the next stages of his solo piano journey. CreditsAll music composed by Bill Laurance Published by Flint Music, administered by BMG PublishingRecorded at St Faith’s Church, Dulwich, London on the 3rd and 4th April 2025 Recorded by Camilo SalazarMixed by Steve Poppleton and Bill LauranceProduced by Bill LauranceMastered by Christoph Stickel @csmastering.com Bill Laurance is managed by Mike Chadwick for Mike Chadwick Management Cover art by Michael Kidner, Butterfly Wings, 1966 Oil on canvas, 168 x 183 cm (Image has been adjusted for print) © Estate of Michael Kidner, courtesy of Flowers Gallery