While we're doing jazz in Bergen, this is a collection of three videos recorded in late May this year during the Nattjazz festival in Bergen. Soko Steidle is a Berlin-based combo given to free improvisation and housing ultra-fine front line jazzers in Rudi Mahall (again) and Henrik Walsdorff with Jan Roder and Oliver Steidle, the leader.
These chaps have three cds out so far, the two most recent ones on Jazz Werkstatt, which you are hereby advised to run out and get. This was uploaded by Steidle, but obviously not recorded by him as he was playing, except for the first sequence which has them heading down Vetrlidsalmenningen and along Vågsbunnen with Walsdorff in a wheelchair(!). Practical jokers, eh? I always make a point of catching them whenever they are in town and so also on this occasion., being seated a little bit to the right of the stage. Keep an eye out for some superb Mahall leg twitching and Walsdorffian bohemian chic. A sure sense of sartorial elegance all around.
Henrik Walsdorff - as
Rudi Mahall - bcl
Jan Roder - ba
Oliver Steidle - dr
DecidersII from kinabalu on Vimeo.
A little more home-made video from yours truly. This combo played at the USF in Bergen as part of the autumn programme of the Bergen Jazz Forum. Put together by the bassist Ole Morten Vågan, it has a fine sampling of some of Europe's finest, Rudi Mahall and Axel Dörner from Germany (Globe Unity Orchestra, Monk's Casino and Die Entäuschung), Fredrik Ljungkvist from Sweden (Atomic), Jon Fält from Sweden (Bobo Stensson) and the leader, Ole Morten Vågan from Norway.
They did their first recording in chronological order, just as the tunes appear on the cd, which by the way is just out on Jazzland. This video jumps in at the extra number, composed by Vågan and hence called Extravaganza. Geddit? Thought so. Lots of humour in this music, lots of quirky changes and lotsa fun for those who were there.
The Deciders live at USF, Bergen, Norway, 9 November 2011
Rudi Mahall - bass clarinet
Axel Dörner - trumpet
Fredrik Ljungkvist - tenor sax, clarinet
Ole Morten Vågan - bass
Jon Fält - drums
The file containing Numbers 6 to 8 was too large to upload to Vimeo so it can downloaded from here.
There seems to be a worry in recent comments that RapidShare links have disappeared. Actually, they haven't. RS has unilaterally imposed a cap of 30 gb downloads per day on paid accounts and one - 1 - gb per day on free accounts. So if files are not accessible, it means that the download cap has been exceeded for that day. Downloaders are advised to try again the next day or until the files are again accessible. We don't like it a bit, but that's the way the ball bounces with this file server business. As they say, sorry for any inconvenience caused, but don't blame us, please.
Here is a video recording featuring the excellent sax player Jon Irabagon. This was the final tune in a three-set performance at Dyvekes Vinkkjeller in downtown Bergen, arranged by Evans Jazz Club, recorded Friday 19 October during a brief tour of Western Norway. The line-up is
Jon Irabagon - alto sax
Norvald Dahl - piano
Axel Grieg - bass
Nils Drønen - drums
They did a bunch of self-penned tunes, but also some fine covers, as the one selected here, "Resolution" off John Coltrane's seminal "A Love Supreme". Jon's been regularly in town over the last few years, playing in different constellations, some local as on this night, but also visiting with Mostly Other People Do The Killing, a quartet which takes an unorthodox view of genre distinctions and which tends to name their tunes after small towns in Pennsylvania. Jon is similarly laissez faire about jazz dogma, playing inside or outside the mainstream as it suits him.
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