Letters From Nowhere, Clara Vetter, Håvard Nordberg Funderud, Petter Asbjørnsen, Fabian Arends – Live in Cologne [CD]

Klaeng-records 074 CD
Letters From Nowhere, Clara Vetter, Håvard Nordberg Funderud, Petter Asbjørnsen, Fabian Arends – Live in Cologne

available as CD and Download

Release 14.03.2023

German pianist Clara Vetter, guitarist Håvard Funderud and bassist Petter Asbjørnsen both from Norway form a great friendship flavoured by artistic interests. Determined to execute their exchanged and collectively grown inspiration in a project during the second lockdown period, the three musicians were challenged to invent new creative working methods.

In their collaborative composing process, written and recorded fragments were sent around and developed, everyone taking turns to continue composing until a piece felt finished. Weekly Zoom meetings allowed the band to hang out, listen to the latest composition developments and share new ideas.
Gathering recorded, written or drawn material in a shared dropbox folder felt like writing little letters to each other - or even to oneself. Once these inspirational impulses were internalized, it seems like they reach all three musicians out of nowhere while playing. This way clear improvisational directions are pointed out that feature the roots of the compositions.

The desire to play together motivated the band to create a performance method even during the second lockdown. Vetter played a live concert in Copenhagen while Funderud and Asbjørnsen were in Oslo, listening on Zoom and controlling her computer through a shared screen and mouse, in real-time. Launching prerecorded material from their composition processes that was hearable on stage while Vetter was improvising, let the band break room and time limitations.

Now that the band is luckily able to meet physically again, these explored concepts are still integrated. Recordings that have been made at a different time and place are collected in samplers that all three musicians are using on stage. Playing together, launching these samples and improvising with their own or their colleagues' past selves, the band translates their ‘room- and time-overcoming’ into a collective live performance. On the band’s first tour, Vetter, Asbjørnsen and Funderud met the renown German drummer Fabian Arends in Cologne. All four musician’s backgrounds connect through the Copenhagen jazz scene with their collaborations or studies. Furthermore, Arends’ work with the modular synthesizer refers well to the band’s way of integrating sampling and live processing. Arends joined as a special guest at the concert at Cologne’s studio, Loft, of which the live recording became this very album.


Clara Vetter - piano, sampler
Håvard Nordberg Funderud - guitar, sampler, live processing
Petter Asbjørnsen - bass, sampler
Fabian Arends - drums, modular synth

1. Excerpt Set II - 31:14
2. Excerpt Set I - 8:13
3. Beginning of the concert - 11:53

Recorded by Stefan Deistler at Loft Cologne
mixed by Dag Erik Johansen
mastered by Havard N. Funderud in 2022
artwork design by Clara Vetter

clara-vetter.de

 

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