Frode Gjerstad Quartet

Frode Gjerstad Quartet: Through the Woods

by Derek Taylor
December 1, 1999

If asked to name the countries that have historically been the hotbeds of European free improvisation it's unlikely that most jazz enthusiasts would include Norway among their lists. England, Germany and France, yes, but Norway? Granted, players such as Jan Garbarek, Terje Rypdal and Arlid Andersen hail from Norway, but the careers of these veteran improvisers have only flirted with the idiom, their styles more commonly rooted in the creative atmospherics favored by Manfred Eicher's ECM label. Norwegian saxophonist Frode ...