in brief

07.10.2022

Vibrafonjazz til den nye verden

Martin Fabricius Trio: »The New World«

Zack's Talent & Berthold Records, 7. okt.

Kristoffer Møllegaard. © Kristoffer Møllegaard

New World kan indekseres under den måske lidet anerkendte undergenre »hyggejazz«. Musik til de afslappede stunder, bedst indtaget med morgen- eller aftenkaffen. Det er en utroligt velkomponeret og -spillet udgivelse, som i høj grad fortjener den interesserede lytters opmærksomhed.

Fabricius’ vibrafon har en meget syngende kvalitet over sig. Kompositionerne virker nynnede – som om kimen til dem har været et nynnet melodisk stykke. Der er noget folkevise ved det, som klæder det bundsolide fundament, leveret af Jacob Hatholts aldrig overspillede trommer og Andreas Markus’ føjelige akkompagnement og smagfulde soli på kontrabas.

Overordnet set skaber de tre musikere et ret konsistent helhedsindtryk, der kun et par få gange forstyrres af nogle mærkbart anderledes, folkemusikalske indslag – derudaf-trommer i »Beef No More« og den strøgne kontrabas i »First Train Out.« Der er som sådan ikke noget i vejen med sådanne i det store hele ikke særligt imposante musikalske stilspring, men det springer i ørerne på en udgivelse, der ellers vinder på lige netop sit uniforme udtryk.

New World er stemningsskabende jazz, der ikke tilsigter at imponere med ild og soli, men derimod med en skarp sans for kompositioner, der briseagtigt kan glide køligt over dig, men også vil belønne den opmærksomme lytter med masser af små finesser. Det er let – men ikke på den kaloriefattige facon.

playlist

03.04

My name is James Black – would you like to see my playlist?

»Music is a deep, but not serious, spiritual practice, in which creator, collaborator, and consumer alike are their own personal pope.«

James Black (b. 1990) is a composer, performer, and artistic director of Klang Festival – Copenhagen Experimental Music. Originally from Bristol, England, they moved to Copenhagen in 2013. Black's works have attracted a large amount of attention both nationally and internationally for their signature combination of artistic courage and vulnerability, described by the Danish Arts Council as »a universe of real madness where everything goes«. Their work is a deep and personal exploration of topics such as religion, loss, and queer identity, that is unafraid to be stupid or serious in any direction.

playlist

02.04

My name is Christian Juncker – would you like to see my playlist?

»Music is just something for me.«

Christian Juncker is a Danish musician and songwriter who has released a number of Danish-language albums. He debuted in 1995 with the band Bloom. Together with his friend Jakob Groth Bastiansen, he formed the duo Juncker in 2002. He is also behind the Christmas carol »Luk julefreden ind« from 2024.

playlist

01.04

My name is Idan Elmalem – would you like to see my playlist?

»Music, for me, reveals the emptiness of boundaries and definitions – in consciousness, in space, and in music itself.«

Idan Elmalem is an oud player and composer working across world and popular music, now presenting his debut instrumental EP and live performance project. Following years of collaboration within the Israeli music scene, he turns toward a more personal and intimate musical voice, blending traditional oud with a contemporary sensibility. Influenced by his studies with master Nissim Dakwar, Elmalem’s music explores the space between tradition and innovation. His debut EP, Time, features three live-recorded pieces that move between past, present, and future, combining classical Arabic and Persian elements with jazz, minimalism, and cinematic sound. Based in Tel Aviv, Elmalem draws on his Moroccan-Danish heritage in his work. He is a graduate of the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Ethnomusicology at the University of Haifa, alongside his work as a player and composer.

31.03

Local Forces Behind New Electronic Festival in Aalborg

On May 29, the Aalborg-based collective Datahaven9000 takes over the venue Skråen, transforming its main hall into a concentrated one-day festival of electronic music. The event is part of the concert series Bystanders #3, where the stage is handed over to local scenes rather than the venue’s in-house programming.

in briefrelease

30.03

Inside the Belly of an Alien Sonic Organism

Ideologic Organ / La Becque Editions, 27.03

Nikola Nedeljkovic Gøttsche

Two of contemporary music’s most uncompromising material thinkers meet on Music for Intersecting Planes: the American organist Kali Malone and the French cellist Leila Bordreuil. Malone works with oversaturated blocks of sound and sonic mass as a sustained pressure, while Bordreuil seeks friction – her cello a recalcitrant organism that creaks and resists.

What they share is an ascetic attention to the specificity of their instruments. The organ and the cello are pushed to their outer limits, where recognizability dissolves and overtones emerge like hidden entities.

The title pieces, »Intersecting Planes I» and »II«, unfold as undulating ruptures of sound: animalistic, almost elephantine cries that surge forward and recede again. Only rarely can the sound be identified as organ or cello. (»Pilots in the Night« comes closest to a familiar balance between the organ’s gravity and the cello’s resistance.) Otherwise, the music moves within a field between the metallic and the electronic, as if the sound originates neither from strings nor pipes.

It is not mass that is being explored here, but rather a kind of hollowness: an airiness that is not light, but permeated by an indeterminate resonance – something ancient, almost ceremonial. The album holds something far more porous and open than Malone and Bordreuil’s earlier works. The sound appears as a concave form, bending inward, like an absence of material. The sonic landscape carries its own dissolution within it as an inherent delay – as if the music exists, first and foremost, as the erosion of something one thought one heard.

English translation: Andreo Michaelo Mielczarek