Polish, Copenhagen-based double bass player Tomo Jacobson founded his own boutique label Gotta Let It Out in order to document the vibrant, new avantgarde scene of his adopted city. His label new release – a limited-edition cassette plus download option – is divided between two performances, both with the same theme: body.
The first side is a 44-minutes free-improvisation of an ad-hoc trio – Jacobson on the double bass, the rarely recorded, Danish electronics player-vocalist Maria Laurette Friis and another expat, Italian pianist Emanuele Maniscalco, who collaborated before with Jacobson in the Il Sogno trio. This trio was recorded live during Jacobson’s month-long residency at the local 5e club in February 2016. The ethereal voice of Friis and her subtle electronics set the atmosphere of this dreamscape, gently supported by minimalist bowing work of Jacobson and the sparse playing of Maniscalco. Slowly Maniscalco with fragmented, rippling gestures and Jacobson with delicate pizzicato and arco work transform the evocative, minimalist interplay into a more playful one, adding more more volume,but keeping it colorful and nuanced until its touching coda.
The second side features another collaborator of Jacobson, Latvian, Copenhagen-based soprano sax player Kārlis Auziņš, who plays in Jacobson’s Mount Meander quartet. Auziņš recorded three, untitled solo pieces in Jacobson’s Monastic Studios in October 2017. The opening, short solo piece is a masterful demonstration of extended breathing techniques, comprised of waves of dense, cyclical eruptions that often sound like a Celtic bagpipes. The second piece is a lyrical 31-minutes improvisation, close in its spirit and sonic territory to the solo projects of British John Surman. Auziņš tells here a complex, multilayered story with commanding elegance and great focus on detail. The last improvisation is the most emotional one despite its flirting with sustained, noisy breathes.
Eyal Hareuveni
Tomo Jacobson (b), Maria Laurette Friis (v, elec), Emanuele Maniscalco (p), Kārlis Auziņš (ss)
