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Euphorium_freakestra: Free Acoustic Supergroup
by Mark Corroto
Thanks to pianist and director Oliver Schwerdt, the Euphorium_freakestra is and always has been a glorious experiment in organized disorganization. The double CD Free Acoustic Supergroup is the ensemble's seventh release. Schwerdt's experiments began with the single disc Ðal Ngai (Euphorium Records, 2004) and eventually the group's 3-CD Grande Casino (Euphorium Records, 2018). Ðal Ngai included the guest artists Friedrich Schenker and Günter Baby Sommer. Other releases found the ensemble hosting musicians such as Thomas Lehn, Barry Guy, and Bertrand ...
read moreEUPHORIUM_freakestra: soundz offfe drzk wähuh
by Mark Corroto
The funny thing about DNA is that just when scientists believe it to be the identifiable signature of all living things, along comes CRISPR gene editing. This technology allows an operator to edit the basic genetic material of an organism, much like the music of Oliver Schwerdt's EUPHORIUM_freakestra. We're not talking science fiction here, more like a Miles Davis chameleon-like approach to music. Schwerdt heads an almost constantly changing crew of musicians that blend a bitches brew kind of sound. ...
read moreEuphorium_freakestra: Grande Casino
by Glenn Astarita
Indeed, the earth can be a delightfully bizarre habitat. With this ten-piece aggregation assembled by pianist, musicologist Oliver Schwerdt and featuring legendary improvisers Barry Guy (bass) and Gunter 'Baby' Sommer (drums, perc), ideas, and perhaps life itself penetrate through unchartered peripheries of time and reason. This European ensemble toys with your psyche due to electro-acoustic hyper futuristic avant-garde fare, abetted by the estimable tenor saxophonist Bertrand Denzler and all involved parties. However, this is not easy listening in ...
read moreEuphorium_freakestra: Grande Casino
by Mark Corroto
It may be fitting that the very first translation of James Joyce's Ulysses was from English into German. What, you ask, does this have to do with the three- disc release Grande Casino by Euphorium_freakestra? It's not a suggestion to read (or attempt to read) Ulysses, a book so dense in its 730 pages that it is almost impenetrable. Its modernist, stream-of-consciousness writing is full of puns and parodies, formulated into 18 episodes, each written in a different style and ...
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