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BALTIC QUARET
Petras Vysniauskas - soprano saxophone (Lithuania)
Vladimir Volkov – viola da gamba, double bass (Russia)
Bobo Stenson – piano (Sweden)
Klaus Kugel - percussions (Germany)
The members of BALTIC QUARTET have made it their business to create a new type of contemporary music, in whose center a rediscovered spiritual longing stands, which originates from their own European roots. BALTIC QUARTET has developed into atonal body of its own coining. Each piece has its own personality and atmosphere, borne by the composition's guidelines as well as by the player's personalities.
PETRAS VYSNIAUSKAS
Petras Vysniauskas is an outstanding jazz musician and multi-instrumentalist. He has performed in many European countries and took part in nearly all major jazz festivals in West and East Europe. Inspired by his playing, several composers of symphonic or chamber music composed pieces for him. He is creative, versatile and has an extraordinary virtuosity, and is able to incorporate differing styles of jazz as well as contemporary concert music in his playing without loosing his links with his personal roots - the spirit and profundity of Lithuanian folk-music.
He played with Steve Lacy, Vyacheslav Ganelin, Han Bennink, Jon Christensen, Tomasz Stanko, Vladimir Chekasin BigBand, Kent Carter, Theo Jorgensmann, Jimmy Owens, Elliot Sharp, Paul Jeffrey, the "Rova Saxophone Quartet", "Jazz Baltica", and many others. In addition he performs in a duo with the distinguished Lithuanian folksinger Veronika Povilioniene.
"Something of the rugged beauty of the Lithuanian countryside and the passion of many of his fellow countrymen has been breathed into his music. For me Petras Vysniauskas' music remains unforgettable because of his clear, individual concept. The use of themes from traditional folk music is one facet of this saxophonist, who reflects both the modern development in jazz and the sound idioms of the new and latest improvised and composed music. However, as he himself says, his feeling for folk music is part of his musical identity. And he adds: "In Lithuanian folk songs I hear echoes of John Coltrane; I try to combine this with the free form of expression offered by modern jazz"..."
VLADIMIR VOLKOV
Vladimir Volkov, one of the leading free-jazz-musicians of Europe, is a music phenomenon passing different genres and styles. The musicians combine avantgarde, improvised music with traditional folklore roots in a very creative way. They played on many international stages and won several international awards. Vladimir Volkov also played in "Collegium Europe", run by Wieland Kuyken, "The Moscow Composers Orchestra" and in the Cross Culture Project "Vershki da Koreshki" (VeDaKi) with musicians from Senegal und Tuva. He also worked with Anatoly Vapirov, Petras Vysniauskas, Tomasz Stanko, Ernst Reijseger, Kenny Wheeler, Bobo Stenson, Ned Rothenberg, Klaus Kugel, Michael Moore and Kaigal-ool Khovalyg (Huun Huur Tu). In 1998 he played in the project Black Sea with Izmailov, Tavitian, Vapirov and Yankoulov which was especially organized for the Leipzig Jazz Festival. Since then he has played with Arkady Shilkloper and Sergey Starostin of Moscow Art Trio and with Sainkho Namchylak and Vladimir Tarasov. In 1999 he has toured with his band "Vershki da Koreshki" and the Norwegian singer Mari Boine thoughout Europe.
BOBO STENSON
"My playing has become more simple and more precise, I've come closer to what I want to say and more straightforward" says Bobo Stenson (born in 1944).
At the same time as this shift in his expression has taken place, the career of pianist Bobo Stenson has accelerated. Since 1988 he has been part of the Charles Lloyd and Thomas Stanko Quartets, while promoting a long list of his own projects where his own trio has been, and is, the most important ingredient.
But this increased concentration in his playing, does not mean that he has placed his lyrical core in hock, only that he reaches it more quickly. Once there, he is absorbed by a tonal flow as ever before, grasping the tones one by one, juggling them until they form a shimmering bouquet. No wonder he has attracted so wide a range of musical temperaments as Stan Getz, Don Cherry and Jan Garbarek. Today he divides his time between a numbers of different groups. "You don't get into a rut as easily that way and you develop yourself in fresh company. But mostly because it's a lot of fun to play with different musicians."
Bobo Stenson has effectively defined the meaning of modern piano in Sweden since the late 60's. Early in his playing career he has accompanied a long line of visiting American players including Sonny Rollins, Stan Getz and Gary Burton, worked closely with Don Cherry from the beginning of the trumpeter's residency in Scandinavia, and George Russell, as well as playing with local giants such as the still-too-little-known tenor saxophone player Bernt Rosengren.
In May 1971 his trio album Underwear was recorded and that album was certainly one of the first European trio albums that could be considered as a response to American developments in post-Bill Evans piano. Bobo Stenson had obviously monitored the mixture of lyricism and abstraction that fuelled the early trios of Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett but was able to assimilate this influence in a style which even then was clearly his own, and his interaction with Norwegian drummer Jon Christensen was already remarkable.
The late 70's and early 80's found Bobo concentrating primarily on the development of his Swedish projects, particularly the cooperative band Rena Rama together with, among others, double-bass player Palle Danielsson. In 1988, Bobo Stenson joined the re-vamped Charles Lloyd Quartet and since 1996 he has been appearing at major jazz festivals with Tomasz Stanko's Septet/Sextet, featuring arrangements of Krzysztof Komeda's compositions for film and for jazz ensemble.
In his early teens Bobo came in contact with other like-minded enthusiasts in his hometown and he played a lot together with bassist Ivar Lindell and trumpeter Lars Farnlof. They used to look around for places to jam and transported a piano on a bicycle barrow, sometimes having to haul it up several flights of stairs just to get the chance of playing. At the same time Bobo continued playing classical piano, taking lessons from a teacher for about fifteen years. Although Bobo enjoyed those lessons he was really more interested in jazz music, so the quality of his classical playing was uneven at times. His teacher, however, was very sympathetic as he himself had played jazz in his youth and he understood what Bobo was doing. - Bobo still plays classical music today and Bach is a constant challenge. It keeps his technique in shape.
Bobo never experienced any identity crises as many did around 1960 when jazz disappeared from the open-air dance-floors and the popular music forums. "Jazz was a kind of artistic music to us and we took it in all seriousness. One of the great, decisive experiences to me occurred when Coltrane's 'Ballads' was issued. We listened to it at bassist Ivar Lindell's place and I was deeply affected. In fact I still tremble with emotion when listening to it."
After his military service Bobo studied music science for a time but soon playing once more prevailed. He never planned to become a musician. It just happened that way. Drummer Rune Carlsson formed a trio together with Bobo and Palle. They went to Germany and played in clubs every day with Dexter Gordon and Benny Bailey but there was no money in it. Consequently they had to pawn their cameras and other belongings to come home again. Soon the gigs became more frequent and varied. He played in the group Opposite Corner, as well as a theatre review and a tour with a well-known Swedish entertainer. When bassist Red Mitchell moved to Sweden in the late 60's he formed a trio with Bobo and Rune Carlsson and toured Europe.
And now the foundations were being laid for some other co-operations of long duration - the 'Norwegian' group (with Jon Christensen and Arild Andersen) and Rena Rama, the group that would exist for more than two decades.
The 70's was an extremely intensive period for Bobo, playing in innumerable constellations and finally he even had to decline offers to play. At that time he had a quartet with among others Jan Garbarek, who together with the other members suddenly also started playing with Keith Jarrett. This resulted in Bobo's group having some of Jarrett's tunes in the repertoire, for which Bobo was a little uncomfortable due to the obvious comparison with Jarrett. But Bobo has never chosen to copy anyone, Jarrett, McCoy Tyner or Bill Evans. Nevertheless Bobo admires Jarrett's music and when Jarrett performed in Stockholm in the 60' they became close friends.
Bobo seems to be able to play as much as he wishes and even more than that. That makes it necessary to be selective. He constantly needs new musicians to play with, new situations and audiences to support his musical appetite. The most important thing to him is "feeling", and that often arises by the communication between the musicians. "How you play is important. Improvising means to make a composition out of the ideas and situations that suddenly occur and really try to invent something, to create energy, to make it give off sparks…."
KLAUS KUGEL
"Klaus Kugel is a percussionist so high-grade deft and perceptive an ensemble of soloists such like this can only wish for." (Frankfurter Rundschau)
Klaus Kugel studied at the School of Jazz in Munich. Since 1989 he is playing intensively with the lithuanian soprano-saxophonist Petras Vysniauskas in many different projects.
He also has worked alongside Michel Pilz, Theo Jorgensmann, Tomasz Stanko, Zbigniew Namyslowski, Kenny Wheeler, Charlie Mariano, Karl Berger, Kent Carter, John Tchicai, Lee Konitz, Wolter Wierbos, Reiner Winterschladen, Nils Wogram, Vyacheslav Ganelin, Gerd Dudek, Antatoly Vapirov, Enver Izmaylov, Perry Robinson, Kornel Horvath, Bobo Stenson, Glen Moore, Vladimir Volkov, John Law, John Lloyd, Paul Dunmall, Alec Dankworth, Antony Donchev, Eric Vloeimans, a.o..
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