Treen is the free improvising trio of Danish, Oslo-based alto sax player Amalie Dahl (who leads Dafnie), Lithuanian, Copenhagen-based pianist Gintė Preisaitė (who took the cover photo), and German, Cologne-based drummer-percussionist Jan Philipp (who also did the mixing and mastering). Kaikō is Treen’s sophomore album (following the self-released Baob_, 2024), and the first on the newly-founded Norwegian label Sauajazz, an imprint of Sheep Chase Records focusing on jazz, experimental, and avant-garde music.

The album offers four minimalist, fragmented pieces that stress Treen’s organic and collective, acoustic dynamics and its patient, imaginative timbral searches. Dahl, Preisaitė, and Philipp employ distinct, extended breathing and percussive techniques, preparations with assorted objects, including inside the piano strings, and sculpt and weave intuitive, calm, and slow-shifting, resonant textures. Gradually, these drone-like meditative pieces become richer, more playful, dense, and intense, cementing Treen’s immediate responses to the impulses and the energy of the moment, sometimes even with a spiritual touch.

Treen melts the idiosyncratic voices of  Dahl, Preisaitė, and Philipp into a cohesive sonic entity. The four pieces sound like cyclical, layered ambient pieces that can go on forever, and always reveal more nuances in their gentle, engaging dynamics. The last, title piece is the most dramatic one, and has mysterious cinematic qualities.

Eyal Hareuveni

Amalie Dahl (alto saxophone, objects), Gintė Preisaitė (piano, objects), Jan Philipp (drums, percussion)