The improvisers Margaux Oswald (pno), Aurelijus Užameckis (bass) and Luka Zabric (sax) form a dynamic trio where focused ideas and attention to detail characterise the music. Their distinct individual voices merge into a crisp collective sound and agile interaction, moving swiftly through intensities that shape each musical encounter in its own way.

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[…] dynamically transformative acoustic project […] We envision a cybernetic orchestra that functions as a self-regulating system […] multi-tempo, spectral harmonic texture, […] imitation of the “glitch” concept […], our compositions take on the character of a game, […] empowering the players with significant decision-making authority.

The result is generative music […] characterized by its simplicity and playfulness, […]
expansion over time […] All the components of the ensemble are interchangeable […]
explore new timbres and distinct concepts of independent, organic ensemble playing […]

Our music can be likened to a solar system […] Each component acts as a singular entity with its own parameters, gravity, and harmonic material, fulfilling its role irrespective of the others […] a system governed by the intercorrelations between these elements […] wherein the participants transcend their individual egos to become a part of something greater than themselves […]

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Celebrating the release of their record “The Knapsack, The Hat, and The Horn” on the Copenhagen based label Gotta Let It Out, the trio of Norwegian guitarist Hein Westgaard, U.S. violinist Katt Hernandez, and the Swedish drummer Raymond Strid are coming to Koncertkirken this February. Their unique instrumentation of acoustically plucked and bowed strings with percussion leads the music sometimes into abstract territory, other times into a kind of psychedelic, hypnotic folk music. Tonight they will be joined by the Danish saxophonist Lotte Anker for a unique quartet constellation brimming with potential!

Hein Westgaard is a Norwegian guitarist, improviser and composer, currently based in Copenhagen, Denmark. In addition to his own genre-bending Hein Westgaard Trio mixing folk, rock, country, free jazz and disco, he can be heard in the post-minimalistic quartet Ototoi, working with conceptual sound-art with Ensemble Ektos, in duo with the Lithuanian double bassist Aurelijus Uzameckis or the New Zealand pianist Alexander Ventling, playing ad-hoc free improvised constellations, or simply performing in the solo acoustic guitar format where he focuses on his own instrumental songs in the fingerpicking tradition.

Raymond Strid is one of the most important voices in free improvised drumming in Scandinavia. Particularly inspired by some of the European master drummers like Han Bennink, Paul Lytton and Tony Oxley, Strid’s first concert was 30 September 1977 and he subsequently performed in a variety of local groups in Stockholm. In 1988 he formed the Swedish trio GUSH together with Mats Gustafsson and Sten Sandell. Raymond Strid works constantly with occasional ad-hoc groups and temporary meetings. He has been touring and participating regularly at major improvisation festivals in Europe and North America. He also considers that, since around 2005, his playing moves stylistically between free improvisation and free jazz, sometimes mixing the two. Raymond Strid also teaches improvisation, methods and aesthetics.

Katt Hernandez is a renowned violinist from the USA, living in Sweden since 2010. Katt is classically trained on her violin but she has also studied composition, electronic music, jazz, Eastern European folk music and improvisation. Katt Hernandez plays mainly free improvised music and is a veteran of the improvisation and experimental music scenes in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New York. Katt has performed in contexts ranging from underground venues to large concert halls alongside an incredible array of musicians, dancers, visual artists, filmmakers, and performance artists including Joe Maneri, Joe Morris, Jonathan Vincent, Gordon Beeferman, Joel Grip, John Berndt, Matt Samolis, Gene Coleman, Audrey Chen, Saul Levine, Zack Fuller, Erik Ruin, and many others.

Lotte Anker is a improviser, saxophonist and composer of International stature, who since the turn of the century has been among Denmark’s leaders in the field between experimental jazz / improvisation and contemporary music. Anker is known from projects such as Anker, Taborn, Cleaver (w / Craig Taborn and Gerald Cleaver) and Trio with Sylvie Courvoisier and Ikue Mori.