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Jacob Karlzon

Swedish jazz pianist and composer Jacob Karlzon has been compared to luminaries such as Keith Jarrett, Bill Evans, and Sweden’s own legendary Jan Johansson. Karlzon’s playing style oozes technical brilliance, rhythmic and harmonic complexity with a perfect feeling for form. Karlzon describes what drives him:

“We are a modern people with a long history, and it is precisely this which I want to reflect in my music. I am fascinated with the possibilities of new technologies but I also need warmth and a connection with the earth in order to feel happy.”

For a piano virtuoso, he likes to add edge; metal and electro all have their place in his music as well as folk songs from his Swedish homeland. With such an open attitude, Karlzon balances depth and musical ideas to achieve vibrant pulsating soundscapes ranging from light to energetic, fragile to powerful, organic to electronic, sometimes all at once. He calls this approach 'technorganic', a kind of improvisation which bursts out of conventional musical borders.

Karlzon's music sits at the intersection of cool Scandinavian sensibilities (space, melancholy and sensitivity) and their emotional opposites (heat and passion).

Karlzon’s powerful techniques and deep sensibility have made him a popular sideman working together with stars like Cæcilie Norby, Gino Vannelli, Nils Landgren, Till Brönner and Lisa Bassenge as well as being a sought after musical director for artists such as Viktoria Tolstoy.

Whilst he has a growing reputation as an ensemble performer, his personal projects have also received great recognition. In 2010 he was awarded the Swedish Django d'Or and voted Jazz Musician of the Year. In 2012 he was added to the Steinway Artist roster, an international recognition of excellence and in 2015 was acclaimed Jazz-group of the Year in the Swedish Radio’s audience poll.

Jacob Karlzon is always searching for new places, Stylistically and musically, Jacob Karlzon is also well-travelled: He is a classically trained pianist but has shared a stage with big names such as Dominic Miller, Kenny Wheeler, Norma Winstone and Billy Cobham. He has forayed into the world of heavy metal with his albums “More” and “Now,” allowing electronic elements to set the pulse. No wonder he prefers to describe himself as an ‘alternative musician’.

To date Karlzon has produced eleven albums under his own name and the most recent one, ‘Open Waters’, with Warner Music. Besides solo recordings and older quintet and quartet productions, he works primarily with his trio as a creative unit, not just in his music. Following on from concerts in Europe, his trio has toured China and the USA but despite his rising fame and travelling to ever more distant countries, he always likes to return to his roots and earlier musical ideas:

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6
Album Review

Dominic Miller: Vagabond

Read "Vagabond" reviewed by Cary Tenenbaum


The third album by guitarist Dominic Miller echoes the melodic, moody, romantic sounds of a Sting album without lyrics or singing. What we hear is the instrumental interplay of Miller with pianist Jacob Karlzon, bassist Nicolas Fiszman and drummer Ziv Ravitz. The comparison is not surprising as Miller has played with Sting for the last 30 years. He co-wrote one of Sting's hits, 1993's “Shape Of My Heart." Maybe, in fact, Sting's albums are really Dominic Miller records with lyrics ...

5
Album Review

Jacob Karlzon 3: More

Read "More" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay


Pianist/composer Jacob Karlzon--Swedish Radio's 2010 Jazz Musician Of The Year--is difficult to pigeonhole. He's an improviser, a solo artist, a composer and an accompanist, with a longstanding musical relationship with singer Viktoria Tolstoy. In his 20-year career he's released half a dozen albums under his own name and appeared on around 40 others. The Jacob Karlzon 3--the pianist's collaboration with bassist Hans Andersson and drummer Jonas Holgersson--released its first album, The Big Picture (Stunt Records / Sundance Music), in 2011.

326
Album Review

Jacob Karlzon: The Big Picture

Read "The Big Picture" reviewed by Jack Huntley


There is a crisp lyricism to even the most penetrating tracks on Jacob Karlzon 3's The Big Picture that propels the music from the somber to the majestic with equal vitality. Karlzon's nuanced keyboards seamlessly move from spacious repeating themes to intense flurries of solos, all the while supported by Hans Andersson's nimble bass and Jonas Holgersson's plush percussion. This is truly a group recording, with each member providing to a whole, which adds up to a prolific musical experience. ...

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Multiple Reviews

Jacob Karlzon: Heat / Improvisational Three

Read "Jacob Karlzon: Heat / Improvisational Three" reviewed by Chris Mosey


Jacob Karlzon is one of the most interesting pianists on today's Swedish jazz scene--percussive, intense, yet capable of great lyricism. Unwilling to be pigeonholed, he plays in a great many different constellations, most visibly with vocalist Viktoria Tolstoy, great granddaughter of Leo, for whom he composes and arranges.

At the age of 39, Karlzon has already released six albums under his own name, but Heat and Improvisational Three are his boldest statements to date, revealing new facets of a complex ...

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“He has now arrived in the Olympus of European Jazz-pianists” — Jazzpodium

"Swedish jazz has in Jacob Karlzon a musical personality of rare magnitude" —Politiken (Denmark)

"Pianist Jacob Karlzon is quite simply superb. His solos tell a story while incorporating surprising harmonic devices; his left hand accompaniment moves between the forcefulness of a McCoy Tyner to the subtlety of a Bill Evans. Karlzon may well be one of the finest emerging jazz pianists anywhere in the world." —Garry Lee, Australian daily paper.

“Karlzon stakes a credible claim to be counted up there alongside such hallowed Swedish pianists as Bengt Hallberg, —Jan Johansson and Bobo Stensson”

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Vagabond

ECM Records
2023

buy

Open Waters

Warner Music
2019

buy

Now

Warner Music
2016

buy

More

ACT Music
2012

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The Big Picture

Stunt Records/Sundance Music
2011

buy

Cruel But Fair

From: Vagabond
By Jacob Karlzon

Running

From: More
By Jacob Karlzon

The Big Picture

From: The Big Picture
By Jacob Karlzon

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