Didrik Ingvaldsen's Corners

Norwegian trumpeter, composer and educator Didrik Ingvaldsen has studied at Julliard conservatory, honed his skills as in improviser at downtown New York clubs, educated students at Leeds College in England, Tanzania in Africa and at his home town, Stavanger in southern Norway. His main musical vehicle in recent years is the Pocket Corner quintet. This outfit present beautifully the musical universe of Ingvaldsen—modern jazz that is informed by the legacies of innovative trumpeters such as Miles Davis and Don Cherry, 20th century contemporary music and African polyrhythms with its own sound signature marked by a Scandinavian calmness and sense of melancholy.



Pocket Corner

Dog & Moon

DADA

2011

This is the second release of the quintet after 4010—Local Time (CCAP, 2009). All the music was recorded live at the studio and features Inglavdsen's manner of composing—strong themes locked within tight and urgent rhythmic framework that are used as road maps for further abstractions and improvisations. Ingvaldsen demands the members of the quintet reshape the course of these themes, color the sounds and add imaginative sonic fragments to these compositions in order to enrich the shared musical canvas.

Some of the compositions' titles and sounds even compare the dynamics of music making to those of the plastic arts as the open-ended "Painting," "Red Desert" and the dramatic "1968." And indeed there are certain similarities in the manners that a musician, especially this creative quintet, or a painter color abstract—sonic or material—textures according to moods, their surroundings or level of energy. Other compositions as "Adebe" and "Dancer" sound as soundscapes that can benefit modern dance companies.

The title-composition emphasizes the way that Pocket Corner communicates and resonates Ingvaldsen's ideas. Alto saxophonist Glenn Brun Henriksen and guitarist Vidar Schanche adds their opinionated perspectives on the theme while bassist Mikaell Olsson and drummer Ståle Birkeland alternate between pulses while maintaining the thematic envelope.

Pocket Corner is a unique band, comprised of five strong musicians.

Extended Corner

Extended Corner

DADA

2012

The Extended Corner is a ten-member expansion of Pocket Corner quintet, featuring vocalist Elisabeth Nygaard, known for her work with the British Fringe Magnetic band. Ingvaldsen wrote the music to the lyrics of Norwegian of mezzo-poet Julie-Marie Sundal. The music was premiered in the MaiJazz festival in Stavanger in May 2012.

The spirit of the music swings between the theatrical and suggestive delivery of Nygård, reciting in a cool, reserved tone with healthy doses of charm and humor, stories about varied phases of an intimate relationship, and the orchestral abstractions of the Extended Corner. The compositions still offer a certain degree of freedom to all the musicians, even brief distorted sonic searches and powerful, collective eruptions, but these diversions were set deliberately in order to elaborate and stress the dramatic content of the poems, and all are structured and arranged tightly.

Even the instrumental "Gallinejass" adopts a dramatic, Spanish-tinged, narrative that highlights pianist Øyvind G. Dale as its main protagonist. "Fried Fish" offers a different kind of dynamics. Guitarist Schanche and pianist Dale introduce it with an eerie free-improvised soundscape that transforms it to a playful kind of a Kurt Weill/Bertold Brecht song, and again the whole orchestra occupies it as a framework for an energetic ride.

An arresting set of songs, delivered masterfully by Nygård and Extended Corner.


Tracks and Personnel

Dog & Moon

Tracks: Naked Horse Ride; Painting; Between Chairs; Adebe; Reaper; D.C. & D.E.; Dog and Moon; Red Desert; Wrong Direction; Composition Bleu; 1968; Dancer; Frozen Improvisation #2.

Personnel: Didrik Ingvaldsen: trumpet, synthesizer (9); Glenn Brun Henriksen: alto saxophone; Vidar Schanche: electric guitar; Mikaell Olsson: double bass; Ståle Birkeland: drums.

Extended Corner

Tracks: Carnival; Slowly; Morn; Moving; Pride; Gallinejas; Kyss; Fried fish; Nice; Oh!; Da-Tia-Tiaa.

Personnel: Elisabeth Nygård: vocal; Øyvind G. Dale: piano; Arild Hoem: alto saxophone; Inge Breistein: tenor saxophone; Dominique Brackeva: trombone; Didrik Ingvaldsen: trumpet; Glenn Brun Henriksen: alto saxophone; Vidar Schanche: guitar; Mikaell Olsson: double bass; Ståle Birkeland: drums.