Gubemusic albums

Sonar - A Flaw Of Nature

SONAR stands for Sonic Architecture and is a band from Zürich conceived by Stephan Thelen, one of the first generation groove-minimalists in Switzerland who also studied with Robert Fripp. Besides Thelen on electric guitar, the group also consists of second guitarist Bernhard Wagner who – for several years on every Monday in the Zürich music club EXIL - has been playing his inimitable live ambient grooves before and between concerts of Nik Bärtsch's Ronin. The group is completed by Christian Kuntner on electric bass guitar and the young drummer Manuel Pasquinelli from Berne, Switzerland.

The instantly recognizable sound of SONAR is partly due to the special tuning of the guitars and the bass guitar to tritones (C / F# / C / F# / C / F#). A large proportion of the music is played using only the natural harmonics of these two notes, thereby creating a harmonically ambiguous musical microcosmos that the group calls "tritone harmonics". SONAR continues to develop and refine an aesthetical attitude that is partly derived from the Progrock of King Crimson and partly from the minimal music of Steve Reich. Their music is played live without any loops or sequencers and the equipment is consciously held minimal: 2 guitars, 1 bass, 3 small amps, 1 compact drumset. Practically no effects such as delays or distortion are used to keep the music as radically clear, concise and direct as possible. Because of this clarity and the use of „smart beats“ (complex, polyrhythmic grooves and rhythms), they create trance-inducing atmospheres and idiosyncratic soundscapes. The band does not consider itself a group of soloists, but rather a groove-chamber- orchestra where the collective efforts are the main concern.

Sha - Greatest Hits

Jeanette Hubert - On The Run (24BIT)

Singer/songwriter Jeanette Hubert's debut album On the Run stands out for its undiluted immediacy. Enriched by a discrete jazz-flair, these twelve airy and playful pop songs are testimony to the Berlin-based artist's musical chops and vocal prowess. Supported by a promising backing band, her songs take the listener through the ups and downs of life and love – a constitute a remarkable start to her recording career.

DaveStapleton - Flight (24BIT88.2)

MariusNeset - Golden Xplosion (24 bit)

JoshArcoleo - Beginnings (24BIT)

Jürg Wickihalder Orchestra with Tim Krohn & ManuelPerovic - Narziss und Echo

Tim Krohn: Narrator, Text
Jeannine Hirzel: Soprano
Sonoe Kato: Mezzosoprano
Mia Lindblom: Violin
Frantz Loriot: Viola
Seth Woods: Cello
Jürg Wickihalder: Composition, Saxophones
Florian Egli: Altosaxophone, Flute
Michael Jaeger: Tenorsaxophone, Clarinet
Damian Zangger: Trumpet
Bernhard Bamert: Trombone
Manuel Perovic: Arrangement
Chris Wiesendanger: Piano
Daniel Studer: Doublebass

Music by Jürg Wickihalder. Text by Tim Krohn. Arranged and orchestrated by Manuel Perovic.
Recorded September 2011 by Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen at Hard Studios Winterthur.
Sound engineer: Martin Pearson. Mixed and mastered by Martin Pearson.
Cover art and graphic design: Jonas Schoder. Photo: Sheldon Suter. Liner notes: Tim Krohn, Daniel Fueter

The story of Narcissus and Echo, as told by Ovid, demands music of uncharacteristic directness. It is about the call which waits for resonance, for instance, but also about the life-giving principle of mutation, of constant, startling change. And of course it is about eroticism in all its forms.
A genuinely theatrical music is being played out here: the stylistic uniformity is of less interest than the colouration. Or, to put it better; the music gains its unique character through diversity and contradiction. And the text, stringently orientated toward music, acquires a theatrical presence. Manuel Perovic's precisely coloured orchestration and the exquisite performances of all involved created a seductive, erotic atmosphere and contribute to the game of stimulating, astonishing dramatically tension – here too a surprising range of stops are pulled out.

ChiliVanilla - Chili Vanilla

Soopertalented young norwegian band. Some of the best liveperformances I saw this winter! Synne Sanden, vocals (debuting with her own album last year), Steffen Granly Tuba and Siw Øyunn Kjenstad Drums. Worth Listening!

OlaGjeilo - Piano Improvisations(24Bit96khz)

While my first piano album Stone Rose was all pre-composed or outlined, I wanted this sequel to be completely spontaneous. As a pianist, free improvisation is where my heart is."

Evocative, lyrical music for 1, 2 & 3 pianos, improvised and performed by Ola Gjeilo, including fantasies around three of his choral works; Ubi Caritas, Tota Pulchra Es and Prelude.

Ola Gjeilo (pronounced Yay-lo) was born in Norway in 1978, and moved to America in 2001 to begin his composition studies at the Juilliard School in New York City. Presently a full-time composer and pianist based in the US, his published concert works are performed all over the world. Ola is also very interested in film, and his music draws a lot of inspiration from movies and cinematic music.

Fly - Year of the Snake

On its second ECM CD, recorded in New York last year, Fly continues to overturn the conventions of the sax/bass/drums trio. Mark Turner, Larry Grenadier and Jeff Ballard share freedom and responsibilities in a democratically-constituted band of equals, which is never about soloist-and-accompaniment. More often coolheaded and thoughtful than incantatory, the trio’s music subtly interweaves improvisation and composition; there are some deep conversations, and reflections on jazz history, taking place inside it. All three members contribute tunes to the programme of “Year of the Snake”, which builds on the achievements of the earlier “Sky and Country” (“Clever, expert, 100% engaged, and very musical” – The Guardian).

KetilBjørnstad - Vinding's Music - Songs from the Alder Thicket

A double album as literary soundtrack, its release coinciding with Norwegian publication of the one-volume edition of Ketil Bjørnstad’s highly-acclaimed fictional trilogy “To Music”/”The River”/”The Lady In The Valley”, and with the author’s 60th birthday on April 25. After keeping his musical and writing activities separate for decades, Ketil dissolved the boundaries with his “Vinding” books: “When I had the idea of writing a trilogy about the young piano student Aksel Vinding, I realised that I would have to grant music access to my world of writing. This felt surprisingly liberating, almost like a confession. Music is a powerful source of inspiration for many writers, and so it was for me when I relived, through the novels, my experiences as a young piano student in Oslo in the late 1960s and early 1970s.” When the trilogy was completed, a concert of music referenced in Bjørnstad’s narrative was mounted in Oslo. Pianists Jie Zhang and Gunilla Süssman, with the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, performed compositions by Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, Ravel, Rachmaninoff, and Barber, with conductor Christian Eggen also heard as piano soloist in the second movement of Mozart’s A major piano concerto. A recording from the concert comprises volume two of the present set. Disc one features Bjørnstad as improvising solo pianist, meditating upon themes related to his protagonist.

Stuttgarter Kammerorchester & Dennis RussellDavies - Witold Lutosławski / Béla Bartók: Musique Funèbre

Dennis Russell Davies has had a long-running and highly productive association with the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra – documented on exceptional ECM recordings of repertoire from Mozart to Kancheli - and is currently the orchestra’s Conductor Laureate. Here he leads them through spirited performances of Bartók’s “Divertimento”, “Romanian Folk Dances” and “Seven Songs” (on which the orchestra is joined by the Hungarian Radio Children's Choir.) This selection of lively Bartók pieces is viewed through the prism of Wittold Lutosalwaski’s “Musique funèbre”, written in memory of the great Hungarian composer, and first performed on the 10th anniversary of Bartók’s death. It’s an important, and moving, piece (and one which also led to international recognition for Lutoslawski).

AlexeiLubimov - Claude Debussy: Préludes

CD 1

Préludes premier livre
Danseuses de Delphes
Voiles
Le vent dans la plaine
"Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l'air du soir"
Les collines d'Anacapri
Des pas sur la neige
Ce qu'a vu le vent d'ouest
La fille aux cheveux de lin
La sérénade interrompue
La cathédrale engloutie
La danse de Puck
Minstrels

Alexei Lubimov Bechstein (1925)

Trois Nocturnes
Transcription pour 2 pianos 4 mains par Maurice Ravel
Nuages
Fêtes
Sirènes

Alexei Lubimov Steinway (1913)
Alexei Zuev Bechstein (1925)

CD 2

Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune
Transcription pour deux pianos par Claude Debussy

Alexei Lubimov Bechstein (1925)
Alexei Zuev Steinway (1913)

Préludes deuxième livre
Brouillards
Feuilles mortes
La puerta del vino
Les fées sont d'exquises danseuses
Bruyères
General Lavine - excentric
La terrasse des audiences du clair de lune
Ondine
Hommage à S. Pickwick Esq. P.P.M.P.C.
Canope
Les tierces alternées
Feux d'artifice

Alexei Lubimov Steinway (1913)

Recorded April 2011

ECM New Series 2241_42

Steve Kuhn, Steve Swallow & JoeyBaron - Wisteria

Wisdom and wistfulness are intertwined in “Wisteria”, whose title track, written by Art Farmer, takes us back to the early 60s, when both Steve Kuhn and Steve Swallow sang softly of the blues in the trumpeter-flugelhornist’s band. They’ve shared a lot of history since then. Swallow played on Kuhn’s classic “Trance”; Kuhn played on Swallow’s “Home” and “So There”. Drummer Joey Baron has been heard with Kuhn on ECM discs including “Remembering Tomorrow” and the dazzling tribute disc “Mostly Coltrane”. This new album takes a fresh look at several pieces heard in Kuhn’s orchestral “Promises Kept” collection, but alongside the aching balladry there is also some driving hard bop (on “A Likely Story”) , a brace of Swallow tunes (“Dark Glasses”), Carla Bley’s gospel-tinged “Permanent Wave” and the Brazilian “Romance” by Dori Caymmi… In all, a varied programme that the trio seems to sail through effortlessly, master musicians beyond the need to prove anything, creating the agreeable illusion that this demanding music is playing itself.

John AbercrombieQuartet - Within a Song

“Within A Song” celebrates the spirit of discovery that illuminated the jazz of the 1960s, as John Abercrombie declares his musical loyalties in a quartet album that pays tribute to a range of early influences including Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins and Jim Hall. “This was the music that spoke to me. When I heard it, it was like finding a new home.” The group assembled especially for this production, recorded at New York’s Avatar Studios in September 2011 features tenorist Joe Lovano as the optimal partner for Abercrombie. Together they mine deep feelings from these modern jazz classics.

Roscoe Mitchell & The NoteFactory - Far Side

Recorded March 2007

TerjeRypdal - Crime Scene

Terje Rypdal electric guitar
Palle Mikkelborg trumpet
Ståle Storløkken Hammond B-3 organ
Paolo Vinaccia drums, sampling
Bergen Big Band
Olav Dale conductor

Recorded live at Bergen’s Natjazz Festival in May 2009, “Crime Scene” is a powerful and exciting addition to Terje Rypdal’s ECM discography. Although the Norwegian guitarist/composer has written often for orchestras or chamber ensembles – see, for instance, his “Undisonus”, “Q.E.D.”, “Double Concerto” and “Lux Aeterna” recordings – collaborations with jazz big band have less frequent.

Invited to write music for the Bergen Big Band, however, Rypdal was intrigued firstly to find that the two of the ensemble’s sax players and also conductor/flutist Olav Dale doubled on bass clarinet: “Three bass clarinets! That straight away offers unusual sound-colour and textural possibilities for a composer”. He was also impressed to learn that the Bergen musicians had just issued an album of variations on John Coltrane’s “Meditations” (“Meditations on Coltrane”, Grappa Records, 2007), a progressive choice for jazz big band. Late period Coltrane, and “Meditations” in particular, had been one of Rypdal’s own entry points into jazz improvising in the 1960s (“the music spoke to me much more directly than bebop did”) and he was pleased to revisit this formative influence in his composition.

Thus, where the “Vossabrygg” album (recorded 2003, released 2006) was in part a tribute to the Miles Davis of “Bitches Brew”, the plot of “Crime Scene” incorporates its salutes to Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders and the ecstatic glossolalia of their saxophones. Rypdal’s writing for the horns and reeds sends the horns and reeds into the overtone range for long stretches. The Bergen musicians respond to the challenge with real commitment.

A Rypdal small group – his partners Ståle Storløkken and Paolo Vinaccia from the Skywards trio plus old comrade Palle Mikelborg – are flanked by the massed Bergen players, conducted by Olav Dale, in a quasi concerto grosso format, a band inside a bigger band. There is passionate playing both at the centre and on the edges of the music and periodic bursts of flat-out rock jamming by Rypdal and his team, including incendiary exchanges between Terje and Storløkken, the latter perhaps best known for his contributions to noise/electro/improv band Supersilent. When the smoke clears, Mikkelborg and Rypdal evoke the spatial/textural skyscapes of their early collaborations (“Waves”, “Descendre”); a good deal of Rypdal’s musical history is referenced here.

The shards of film and radio-play dialogue scattered through the album, collected and collaged by Paolo Vinaccia, add a Noir-ish flair to the work, prompting Rypdal to add crime procedural titles to the music’s individual movements, though he stresses that connections between the subheadings and the music can only be loosely interpreted.

The Bergen premiere of “Crime Scene” was very well-received by the media. US webzine Allboutjazz compared Rypdal’s use of texture and sound colour to György Ligeti’s, and also observed, that “as fine a piece as ‘Vossabrygg’ was, Crime Scene surpassed it in scope and performance.”

In Norway, NRK Radio’s review noted that “Rypdal evokes outrageously exciting sounds from the big band set up. The hour-long piece is structured freedom. The tenorists Ole Jakob Hystad and Zontan Vinczes echo sixties Coltrane. And seventies-jazz rock is evoked when Palle Mikkelborg attacks. Through the pieces boil sound sequences from dramatic crime- and mafia flicks. On top soars Rypdal´s ecstatic guitar playing – we have in fact never heard him better."

Christian WallumrødEnsemble - Fabula Suite Lugano

Recorded June 2009

TerjeRypdal - Double Concerto / 5th Symphony

Recorded June 1998

Becky Friend, Charlie Haden, Keith Jarrett, Leroy Jenkins, Paul Motian & SamBrown - Conception Vessel

Recorded November 1972

Ingar Zach, Ivar Grydeland, Xavier Charles & ChristianWallumrød - Dans Les Arbres

Xavier Charles clarinet, harmonica
Ivar Grydeland acoustic guitar, banjo, scruti box
Christian Wallumrød piano
Ingar Zach percussion, bass drum

“Dans les arbres” is both band name and album title of this first release from a Norwegian/French collective that has been pooling energies since 2004, while also drawing on longer-established associations. The release marks the ECM debut of guitarist Ivar Grydeland and clarinettist Xavier Charles. Percussionist Ingar Zach has contributed to projects with Jon Balke (Magnetic North’s “Diverted Travels” and “Statements” by the Batagraf group), while Christian Wallumrød, of course, has been an ECM recording artist for 12 years already, with four albums as a leader for the label, most recently “The Zoo Is Far”, which was issued in 2007.

If the benevolent inspiration of John Cage was felt already on Wallumrød’s “A Year from Easter” (2003) whose titled referenced Cage’s “A Year from Monday”, there are musical-temperamental affinities also on “Dans les Arbres”. Cage had his prepared piano... and Ivar Grydeland has his prepared banjo, whose patient metallic pulse is one of the anchoring sounds here. Rather like Cage or Morton Feldman and other indeterminate music-makers, these improvisers also seem determined to ‘let sounds be sounds’, setting the timbres and textures free, or exploring them in detail, at times with an almost scientific detachment. Theirs is a music of small revelations rather than larger gestures, with arresting sound combinations constantly emerging. Occasionally, with sruti box and clarinet establishing thick drones, it sounds more like Eastern ritual music than Western improvised music. In other moments this strictly acoustic music sounds remarkably electronic.

Terje Rypdal, Patrice Heral, Markus Stockhausen & ArildAndersen - Karta

Recorded December 1999

Per Oddvar Johansen, Paal Nilssen-Love, Sidsel Endresen, Stian Carstensen, Trygve Seim, Oyvind Braekke, Nils Jansen, David Gald, Bernt Simen Lund, Havard Lund, Hild Sofie Tafjord, Morten Hannisdal & ArveHenriksen - Different Rivers

Recorded December 1998, January and December 1999

Vassilis Tsabropoulos, John Marshall & ArildAndersen - Achirana

Vassilis Tsabropoulos piano
Arild Andersen double-bass
John Marshall drums

Terje Rypdal, Terje Tonnesen, Paolo Vinaccia, Palle Mikkelborg, David Darling, Jon Christensen & ChristianEggen - Skywards

Recorded February 1996

Pierre Favre, Paul Giger & JanGarbarek - Alpstein

Recorded 1990-1991

DavidDarling - Cycles

Terje Rypdal, Palle Mikkelborg & JonChristensen - Descendre

Recorded March 1979

Paul Motian & GaryPeacock - At the Deer Head Inn

Recorded September 1992

Christian WallumrødEnsemble - The Zoo Is Far

Extraordinarily concentrated music from the new, expanded ensemble led by Norwegian pianist composer Christian Wallumrød, which introduces three new string players - violinist Gjermund Larsen from the Norwegian folk tradition, classical and improvising cellist Tanja Orning, and Swiss baroque harpist Giovanna Pessi. Together, and along with the long-serving Arve Henriksen and Per Oddvar Johansen, they focus their resources on Wallumrød’s music. Not a note is wasted in these pieces. This is true ensemble music, uniquely nuanced.

Christian Wallumrød Piano, Harmonium, Toy Piano
Arve Henriksen Trumpet
Gjermund Larsen Violin, Hardanger Fiddle, Viola
Tanja Orning Cello
Giovanna Pessi Baroque Harp
Per Oddvar Johansen Drums, Percussion, Glockenspiel

“The Ensemble is this time expanded to a sextet, yet sounds like one organic corpus. Fiddle, harp, cello and trumpet melt together in beautiful melodies like ‘Nash Lontano’. In ‘Arch Dance’ a serial horizontal gesture from piano and glockenspiel is deconstructed in descending glissandi by trumpet and cello... Fragments of Henry Purcell and variations on ‘Psalm Kvaen’ contribute to a structured total experience.”
- Carl Petter Opsahl, Verdens Gang (Norwegian daily newspaper), March 6/2007

“The Zoo Is Far”, the fourth ECM album by Norwegian pianist-composer Christian Wallumrød, presents a further refinement of a highly original group music influenced, in varying degree, by contemporary composition, baroque music, folk, Asian music and - at several removes now - jazz. The new sextet does not replace the quartet that made the exceptional “Sofienberg Variations” and “A Year from Easter”, discs on which Wallumrød, Arve Henriksen and Per Oddvar Johansen were joined by innovative folk violinist Nils Økland. The quartet continues to perform, but the sextet has already acquired a personality and character of its own, reflected in Wallumrød’s tightly written material for it, his combining of sounds and timbres as well as melodic material...

“I am trying to look for the various ensemble sound possibilities rather than having a ‘soloist with accompaniment’ situation. I found lots of new possibilities with this sextet, perhaps most of all in the lower register, as the baroque harp goes quite deep down, and so does the cello. And the piano goes even deeper; all these elements also offer the bass drum some new partners...”

The sextet’s genesis was inspired by a chance meeting with Swiss harpist Giovanna Pessi in Zürich in 2003. The combining of harp and piano was an option Wallumrød had already begun to investigate in 2000 in exploratory concerts with Finland’s Iro Haarla. The opportunity to take this further was welcomed. “The baroque harp has a different sound and differs from the modern harp in the way it is constructed, something that made it a bit easier for me to approach as well. As I was looking for extended possibilities of range and colours within the bowed instruments and already knew about cellist Tanja Orning’s musical versatility, it felt quite natural to ask her to join in, too.” The line-up of the new group was complete with the addition of violinist Gjermund Larsen.

Each of these three players brings a wealth of experience to the total group sound. Pessi’s distinguished resumé includes collaborations with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Jordi Savall, as well as several years of study with Rolf Lislevand. Tanja Orning, previously principal cellist in the Stavanger Symphony is a musician at ease across several genres, open to new music, experienced in rock and interdisciplinary music, she released the album “Cellotronics” (Albedo Records) in 2005, a collaboration with Christian Wallumrød. Gjermund Larsen is a young player from the Norwegian folk tradition. Born 1981, and the son of folk musician Geir Egil Larsen, Gjermund won the national solo fiddle competition at Landskappleiken in 2002, and is the youngest winner in the history of the event.

“Arve Henriksen, as well as Tanja Orning and Gjermund Larsen have this ability to blend perfectly into each other and into the whole ensemble...”

In the Radio Studio of DRS Zürich, with Manfred Eicher producing and classical tonmeister Markus Heiland – more normally associated with ECM New Series – as engineer, the Wallumrød Ensemble approached the recording of “The Zoo Is Far” as they do their entirely-acoustic concert performances, working also with the natural sound of the room as one of the components of the music.

“I’ve long wanted to record the music in a way that puts the acoustic sound – the instruments, the room and the whole situation that influences the way we listen and play – into focus. This means that we can interact in the same way as in the concert situation. While this approach might be the most natural thing for classical musicians, it is a crucial step in my musical development. Today I am thinking about the ensemble and its performance as something that might belong to the world of chamber music.“

Specific musical influences on the pieces on “The Zoo Is Far” derive from Wallumrød’s intense listening to the Fantazias for strings by Henry Purcell (1659-95). Extracts of Purcell’s music are transformed in the three “Backwards Henry” pieces here. “Music for One Cat” is inspired by the Pakistani ghazal singer Mehdi Hassan. The “Psalm Kvæn” pieces were originally written in response to a choral commission. “I think it was natural for me to try to keep within a sort of Norwegian psalm tradition, which is characterized by its idiomatic blend of originally Lutheran chorals and folk songs.”

Yet however many references may be pinpointed the overriding impression the album leaves is one of striking originality and musical independence. As the Norwegian daily paper Verdens Gaang remarks of “The Zoo Is Far”: “Jazz, baroque, minimalism, contemporary music are words that only begin to convey a small spectrum of Wallumrød’s musical universe. He has an authentic sense of sound and structure, and again we are spellbound by the unique syntheses and the balanced contrasts.”

***

Christian Wallumrød, born 1971, grew up in Kongsberg, Norway. His earliest musical experiences included accompanying choirs in the local church. Jazz influences came almost entirely from ECM discs: “The whole ECM field of European and American jazz was a point of departure for my improvising.” He studied at the Trondheim Conservatory where he came into contact with Trygve Seim, Arve Henriksen, Per Oddvar Johansen and others.
Working across ‘jazz’ in many contexts he began to re-evaluate his approach to soloing after hearing the 1960s recordings of Paul Bley. His first ECM recording came in 1996 with “No Birch” a trio recording which also introduced the highly distinctive trumpet sound of Arve Henriksen. By this point the influence of contemporary composers, especially György Kurtág and Bent Sørensen, was also being felt in his writing.

Other ECM recordings soon followed, including a guest role with Trygve Seim and The Source in 2000 (“The Source and Different Cikadas”). With the encouragement of Manfred Eicher he assembled a new group with Henriksen, Per Oddvar Johansen and folk fiddler Nils Økland which recorded “Sofienberg Variations” (2001) and “A Year From Easter” (2004).

***

The press on the Wallumrød Ensemble’s “A Year From Easter”

“Very quiet, but very strong”
John Fordham, The Guardian

“A quiet, tranquil yet powerful album from a genuine original with a highly individual musical outlook. Wallumrød deserves a place alongside the late lamented Edward Vesala and Trygve Seim in the front rank of recent jazz-inspired innovators.”
Chris Parker, Jazz Review

“Absolutely beautiful Scandi-chamber jazz from another great Norwegian outfit. … This is ambient jazz full of small movements and gentle textural changes, but it’s surprisingly robust, with Wallumrød’s piano pleasingly edgy and drummer Per Oddvar Johansen clattering away to good effect. If you buy one Norwegian jazz album this year, this is the one.”
Kerstan Mackness, Time Out London

“This is a record that dares to be different. As close to perfection as you’re likely to hear.”
Duncan Heining, Jazzwise