Teis Semey
Teis Semey is back, and assertively so. His high voltage Nordic avant-garde is invigorating, and the band sounds better than ever. Building on the success of “Mean Mean Machine” (2021) and learning from the choral “Midnight Mess Vol. 1” (2023) and electro-impro “Crudo” (2024), the Danish guitar phenomenon returns to homebase with his Amsterdam quintet. Gather around for “En Masse!”, the new album by the Teis Semey Quintet, released the 26th of September. Danish guitarist Teis Semey was the Artist in Focus at North Sea Round Town 2022. During this residency, Semey was asked to develop a brand new project. Incorporating Danish folk, indie and improvised music, Semey and the band created the Midnight Mess vol.1. Semey’s talent hasn’t gone unnoticed within the young generation of the European jazz scene: with his Quintet he was a featured Footprints Touring artist and a JazzAhead Showcase Artist, performing in many major European clubs and festivals in the latest years. But, otherwise known as an untamable, jump-in-with-the-guns-blazing kind of musician, Semey changes gears in the Midnight Mess vol. 1. Flanked by Kit Downes on organ and his choir, Līva Dumpe, Fuensanta Mendéz, Sanem Kalfa and Marta Arpini, he conducts his troupe through an intimate selection of original music and Danish folk songs. The Midnight Mess vol. 1 is as much a choral album as it is a jazz album. Or an indie album. In other words, ‘kind of, but also’. The style of the band alludes in different directions, and is multi-faceted and purposefully understated. The Midnight Mess vol. 1 shows its colors in low dynamics, only to rarely exceed speaking volume.
EN MASSE!
Midnight Mess vol. 1
Artists
Guitarist and Composer
To be progressive and cute at the same time needs fine balancing. Believe it or not, “Why B Moody When U Can Shake Your Booty” is a track on this political album. Intense electronic tracks, acoustic ballads, one shower, two funerals. If you like to be thrown to many magical places check out danish guitarist latest album “Throw Stones”
01 Face Full of Dirt
02 Mexico in Purple
03 Winter (revisited)
04 Sicilian Colors
05 Funeral
06 Why B Moody When U Can Shake Your Booty
07 Big Dripper
08 Shower Song
09 Funeral (reprise)
10 Hello Bird!
Teis Semey – Guitar
Fuensanta Méndez – vocals
José Soares – Alto Saxophone
Henry Solomon – Alto Saxophone on track 6
Alistair Payne – Trumpet
Young-Woo Lee – Piano
Giuseppe Campisi – Bass
Guy Salamon – Drums
Sun-Mi Hong – Drums on track 4
Max Agnas
“More I Let the World In, Less I Take It in” was both the starting point and the main feeling which kicked off the writing phase for this album.
What you going to hear is more like musical states, own little worlds, rather than compositions. Quite the opposite of trying to blend genres, which is so often done, Max lock himself in with pure, core ideas and start to dig deeper and deeper with what he already has. While exploring the ideas the form and dynamics gets created. In other words, the notes are already there and the structure is being improvised. The compositions becomes an emotional coherence and are full of inventive surprises that would be hard to get without this way of creating.
The track titles already hints that you are going to be in medieval times, on the moon and in Lisbon within the same album. So each composition travels to distinctly different places but is held together by the way of creation.
Max met Salvador on the bandstand at Fasching in Stockholm a few years ago and has since 2020 been a part of his band. In Max’s own words: ”I instantly found a communication within the music that felt very rare and I felt very early on that I wanted him to sing my music” Max and Nils are cousins and has played since childhood. Years of exploring ideas, practicing together and long philosophical talks about everything in life. This music is the result of that. ”The only drummer I feel this music fits for is Nils. He has a very strong personality and freshness that I only find in his way of playing.”
As always Max’s playing feels totally free of doubt which makes you concentrate on the mood and music directly. Both his motives and piano touch has a huge span of variations and always feels highly purposeful. This album is the result of three different personalities of Max.”I have always felt that my albums and music sort of spoke and lived by itself, and that I was the one responsible for it. But with this music, I feel it’s the first time I can say for sure that there is no boundary between the music and me as a musician and composer. The music sort of created itself as I was trying to get through difficulties with life.”
Already at the age of twelve Max Agnas received ”The Fasching soloist prize”,
being the youngest ever to receive the prize. The success has continued and now (eight years later) he has five published albums and played several Europe-wide tours.
Max’s compositions are of an exploring kind; he finds surprising, elegant and striking ways to express himself within traditional frameworks.
You’ll find captivating and atmospheric ballads next to rhythmical tunes with jingle-like melodies, more often than not with a twist that puts everything into a new light.
Although it’s paradoxical to say about a twenty-year-old, Max playing sounds remarkably refined and mature. Having the quality of very often saying more with less and always letting the music, as opposed to technique or ego, dictate what musical decisions are made.
Max Agnas Trio:
Max Agnas, piano and synthesizers
Sebastian Voegler, drums
Mauritz Agnas, double bass
Bakkhos Puns
Bakkhos Puns
Spoken Jazz Ensemble
When The Shine Suns
“Madness stands next to wisdom”
“Compositions that are state-of-the-art played by a magnificent band”
“Sometimes memories from the famous piano-trio e.s.t comes to mind”
“Jazz and text with a sense for theatrical provocation”
“Brilliant Performance”
“A class of its own, expressive and with great expertise”
Sources:
Badische Zeitung, Thomas Loisl Mink
Oberbadische Zeitung, Gottfried Driesch
Der Sonntag, Réne Zipperlen
Fuensanta Méndez
Fuensanta
Ensamble Grande
A full performance extravaganza of voices, drums, horns, and ‘strings’. A homage to Fuensanta’s upbringing in the water forest of Mexico: colorful, beautiful, brutal, and raw. Poetry is the guiding principle. The members of the ensemble are all bright and free-spirited musicians and a large part of the music is left to improvisation – this makes the compositions accurate and alive because our kindred minds make the truest decisions together based on intuition. The summit of my musical universe yet.
Fuensanta is a vocalist, contrabassist, and composer born in Mexico, currently living in the Netherlands. A love for poetry manifests within her songs: sometimes refined and colorful, sometimes avant-garde and raw. Music that has the freedom, richness, and colors of contemporary jazz, but preserves the effectiveness of a popular song.
She has performed in numerous settings (from soloist of a symphonic orchestra, big band, small ensembles, to solo) and venues throughout Mexico and Europe (North Sea Jazz/Bimhuis/Paradiso) with her band. In 2016 she won 1st place, Press Prize, North Sea Prize, and HVC when singing her compositions during the Princess Christina Jazz Concours. She is currently the artist in residency at the BIMHUIS, Amsterdam.
Track List:
1. Cuándo Te Voy A Decir (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
lyricist: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Guy Salamon, Sun-Mi Hong, Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
2. Olas (Waves) [live]
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
3. Perspectiva (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
lyricist: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Teis Semey, Alistair Payne, José Soares, Guy Salamon, Sun-Mi Hong, Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
4. Yo Te Buscaba Tanto (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
lyricist: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Alistair Payne, José Soares, Fuensanta Méndez.
5. Ascensión (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Teis Semey, Alistair Payne, José Soares, Guy Salamon, Sun-Mi Hong, Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
6. No Será Regresar (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
lyricist: Fuensanta Méndez
performers: Alistair Payne, José Soares, Guy Salamon, Sun-Mi Hong, Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
7. Ariles del Campanario (live)
composer: David Haro
lyricist: David Haro performer: Fuensanta Méndez
8. Canción Contra Mi Apatía (live)
composer: Fuensanta Méndez
arranger: Fuensanta Méndez, Brodie Jarvie.
performers: Youngwoo Lee, Teis Semey, Alistair Payne, José Soares, Guy Salamon, Sun-Mi Hong, Fuensanta Méndez, Isabel Mirallas, Marta Arpini, Sanne Rambags, Laura Polence.
Line Up:
voices: Fuensanta Méndez (+ double bass),
Marta Arpini,
Isa Mirallas, Laura Polence
drums: Guy Salamon
Korean drum and percussion: Sun-Mi Hong
trumpet: Alistair Payne
alto saxophone: José Soares
guitar: Teis Semey
piano Youngwoo Lee
Brodie Jarvie
Being able to combine a big yet intimate sound, together with fine sensitivity to the fibres of music makes Brodie as much a grounding force on the bass as an independent voice in any ensemble. His music conjures a feeling of concentric shapes, designed for melodic and harmonic explorations, for both the audience and the band members. The well-contoured play between tension and release puts the music in a constant momentum, drawing the listener closer to the music.
As one of the freshest and most driving forces on the Scottish Jazz scene today, Brodie has shown his strengths as a bass player, bandleader and a composer on multiple occasions. Through the years he has worked and recorded with many esteemed musicians including Tommy Smith, The Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, Texas and his own projects (Quintet, Trio, Septet).
Brodie’s compositions can be as an anthem of a Celtic fairyland, two-feet-on-the-ground ideas combined with an equal portion of mystique and intrigue.
Pull
PULL’s identity travels from the solemn tones of a morning reverence and through to seemlingly chaotic, high intensity sounds. Loaded with influences from traditional jazz, chamber music, folk music and indie rock.
The four members of Pull are constantly writing new music for the band and have been touring around Europe for the past two years. In October 2017, They recorded their second album which consists of thirteen new original tunes and is planned to be released 2018.
“Really seems to relish charging from one influence to the next..Sometimes the music has the boisterous enthusiasm of a beer hall anthem and other times the solemn tones of Sunday morning reverence…straight out of the Todd Sickafoose-Chris Lightcap school of indie jazz.”
“…danceable jazz grooves… spacious and eerie… rockishly chaotic.. Kinetic funk bounces….”
Sources:
George W. Harris, jazzweekly.com
Dave Summer, birdistheworm.com