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EUROPEAN SCENE
By Peter Margasak
Jazz’s roots in Europe are strong. This column looks at
the musicians, labels, venues, institutions and events
moving the scene forward “across the pond.” For
questions, comments and news about European jazz,
e-mail europeanscene@downbeat.com.
Swedish Perspectives Festival Offers Cross-Genre Conversations
Perspectives, an ambitious and fiercely
adventurous event that reedist Mats
Gustafsson has organized in Västerås,
Sweden, looks and behaves like a music
festival. The latest installment of the fest
was held this past March, and it has been
staged sporadically since 2004. Dozens of
concerts were held on multiple stages in different
buildings. There were festival passes
for sale, a thick brochure with bios of the
artists and special releases produced to
mark the occasion. But Gustafsson prefers
to think of Perspectives as a “meeting.”
“Festivals are meeting points,” Gustafsson
said. “When musicians tour and play
club gigs we meet the audience, but we don’t
meet many other musicians, organizers or
media. The festival is a great platform to
meet people, to get ideas, to start new collaborations.
The word meeting is key. It should
be relaxed and you should be able to sit
down and have a beer or a coffee and talk.”
During the 2004 Perspectives, Anthony
Braxton first heard the chaotic electronicnoise
combo Wolf Eyes—an unlikely pairing
that went on to perform together and
released Black Vomit (Victo) in 2006. While
other first-time encounters at the festival
haven’t been as celebrated, the latest installment
witnessed some gripping new constellations
of musicians, including a brilliant set
by British keyboardist Pat Thomas,
Raymond Strid (left) and
Mats Gustafsson
Australian bassist Clayton Thomas and
Swedish percussionist Raymond Strid.
“Festivals around the globe that are run
by musicians are the best ones because we
have the network,” Gustafsson said. “We
have the contacts, we know each other. If we
don’t know each other, we can get recommendations
and contacts quickly in a way a
normal organizer can’t.”
Most of the musicians who’ve performed
at Perspectives are interested in different
sorts of music, so someone like France’s
Xavier Charles can play a set of improvised
clarinet music and then turn around and
create musique concrète with his long-running
trio Silent Block. This year’s event
included people associated with jazz like
GUNNAR HOLMBERG
pianist Marilyn Crispell, bassist Barry Guy
and drummer Sven Åke-Johansson, and
figures from the noise and experimental
scene like Hijokaidan, Borbetomagus and
Otomo Yoshihide. But even that analysis
misses the point, as Guy ended playing
Baroque music and Åke-Johansson sounded
experimental.
Gustafsson and Lennart Nilsson—the
former jazz club owner and philosophy professor
who handles the financial and logistical
needs of Perspectives—have had to
rely on an ever-shifting array of funding
sources over the years, but they’ve never
succumbed to tacky corporate presence.
Perspectives will hold another event in
2011, but without Gustafsson at the helm.
“It takes an enormous amount of work
and time,” he said. “You live with it, waking
up in the middle of the night, thinking about
different ideas. But with I need to be with my
family more and I need more time for my
own work.”
Bringing in new blood has been one of
his goals from the start.
“You have to put it out and to find the
tools to present the spectrum. Then people
can make up their own minds. I would love
young people attending the festival starting
to think that they might be able to do something
of their own on a smaller scale somewhere
else. That would be great.” DB
Rising Canadian Singer Yanofsky Begins U.S. Push
On a Monday night in March, a near-capacity
audience at Catalina Jazz Club in Hollywood
was on its feet after a 90-minute set by singer
Nikki Yanofsky. The crowd contained notables
like Phil Ramone, who produced her recent disc,
Ella …Of Thee I Swing (A440). The Montreal
native, who was making her Southern California
debut, commanded the stage, including a funkbeat
arrangement of “The Wind Cries Mary.”
More remarkably, she’s 15 years old.
The youngest artist ever to sign with Verve
(she participated in the We Love Ella tribute
album), Yanofsky sang on Disney’s High
School Musical 2 and debuted at the 2006
Montreal Jazz Festival. Afterwards, she performed
with the Count Basie Orchestra, Marvin
Hamlisch and Wyclef Jean. Yanofsky has also
been nominated as Best New Artist in Canada’s
Juno Awards, which will be held in June.
While Yanofsky’s father, Richard
Yanofsky, is a pianist, Fitzgerald’s voice
turned her on to jazz.
“I fell in love with her sound, phrasing and
her tone—that’s perfection to me,” Yanofksy
said. “I needed a song for the Montreal Jazz
Festival program. As an experiment, my teacher
at the time, Nancy Martinez, brought me an
arrangement of ‘Airmail Special.’ I heard Ella’s
recording of it, and something clicked. I learned
it in three days and discovered that I had an ear
to hear music and transpose.”
Along with swing, Yanofsky’s disc includes
a couple blues standards, such as “Evil Gal
Blues.” She’s equally enthused about the timehonored
American genre. “The blues are so
important,” Yanofsky said. “It’s roots music.”
After her U.S. visit, Yanofsky plans to tour
her country’s festival circuit this summer. She’s
also keeping the brighter spotlight from changing
her attitude.
“I try to stay grounded and I do that by keeping
close with my family and friends,” she said.
Nikki Yanofsky
“I want to keep growing as an artist and learn
more about music.”
—Kirk Silsbee
EARL GIBSON
June 2009 DOWNBEAT 19