Results for "Cologne"

Moers Festival Interviews: Virginia Genta

by Martin Longley
March 29, 2024

There is a tradition in the small German city of Moers, although its aims are far from traditional in orientation. Unless we consider the already sixty-year history (at least) of jazz-derived free improvisation. The Moers Festival has run since 1972, originally bent on exploring the vitality of free jazz, and still resolved towards that direction today, ...

Mareike Wiening: 'Reveal' Offers Jazz Rhythms of Hope

by Lawrence Peryer
February 17, 2024

Today, the Spotlight shines On Mareike Wiening. Mareike is a drummer and composer who joined us on the occasion of the release of her third record as bandleader, Reveal (Greenleaf Music). Featuring her long-time group: tenor saxophonist Rich Perry, pianist Glenn Zaleski, guitarist Alex Goodman, and bassist Johannes Felscher, the band is joined on ...

Carl Zinsius

Carl Zinsius is a German musician: drummer, percussionist and teacher, currently living in Cologne.
He studied his Bachelor’s degree in Jazz-drums at  Conservatorium Maastricht (NL) and Siena Jazz University (It) and had the chance to take lessons with some of the most reknown musicians, like Peter Erskine, Gregory Hutchinson or Joey Baron.
He leads his own group, the Carl Zinsius Project (debut album in 2024!), is the percussionist and co-leader of the group Mondo Chôro, and drummer for the interdisciplinary project Everyday Feelings.
Concerts have brought him to travel Europe, Africa as well as North and South America.

Moers Festival Interviews: Kenny Garrett

by Martin Longley
March 4, 2023

The release of Kenny Garrett's Sounds From The Ancestors album (Mack Avenue, 2021) has reinvigorated his live performances, as the saxophonist tours heartily with an expanded band that's heavy on the Afro-Latin percussion. In recent times, multi-instrumentalist Garrett has been gigging with this dedicated Sounds From The Ancestors line-up, heavily devoted to the album, but not ...

Moers Festival Interviews: Brandon Seabrook

by Martin Longley
February 12, 2023

Brandon Seabrook cultivates a forked assault on the guitar and the banjo, amplifying both of them, and negotiating their strings at high speeds, filling his playing with hyper-detailed improvisations, or constructing complex compositional strategies, frequently referred to as 'riffs.' Seabrook has long been a crucial presence on the New York City scene, whether leading his own ...

Moers Festival Interviews: Sana Nagano

by Martin Longley
June 4, 2022

Right place, right time, your scribe caught Smashing Humans playing a late night set at the original Nublu club in NYC's Alphabet City, 19th April 2019. Intensity ensued, via a serrated prog-jazz extremity, sharply sculpted in its dynamic schizoid turning of sharp bends, its abrasive surface causing exciting distress. Smashing Humans were assembled by the Japanese ...

Moers Festival Interviews: Max Johnson

by Martin Longley
June 3, 2022

New York bassist Max Johnson has embarked on a European tour with his trio, in the run-up to the release of their new album Orbit Of Sound (Unbroken Sounds, 2022). They are playing crucial venues such as Roskam in Brussels and The Loft in Cologne, doubtless climaxing at the Moers Festival, also in Germany (3rd-6th June). ...

Moers Festival Interviews: Chris Pitsiokos

by Martin Longley
May 30, 2022

Alto saxophonist Chris Pitsiokos has successfully made a deep impression on the improvising scene of NYC during what amounts to almost the last decade. Still youthful, his raging complexity and conceptual attitude have the backing of a dedication to finding gigs, or even promoting his own events, and of always seeking out unfamiliar players for adventurous ...

Moers Festival Interviews: Spinifex

by Martin Longley
May 24, 2022

Spinifex will make an extremely welcome return to the Moers Festival in early June 2022. This heavily international group specialises in a collective meshing, combining the precision of composed themes with ample leeway for crashing over the barriers, splattering down onto a grassy field of wild improvisatory freedom. Heavy activity over a decade's span makes this ...

Week Of Surprise 2021

by Martin Longley
February 27, 2022

Week Of Surprise Stadtgarten/Christuskirche Cologne, Germany October 11-16, 2021 In the usual times, Week Of Surprise would be Night Of Surprise, with all of its sonic wonderment compressed into a kaleidoscopically overlapping sequence, where chance encounters were actively encouraged. In virus times, a more sober incarnation came into ...