About two years ago the director of the Viennese acclaimed club Porgy & Bess, Christoph Huber, succeeded to convince Swedish sax titan Mats Gustafsson, now resident of the Austrian town Nickelsdorf, to change his plans for his 50th birthday. Gustafsson wanted to spend the day with his wife and three daughters eating his favorite dish - reindeer steak with black trumpet mushrooms, mashed potatoes and lingon berries. Huber had a better offer, a celebration, 3-day festival with friends and comrades from the States and all over Europe that will celebrates what Gustafsson stands for, Peace & Fire.
Peace, for taking Gustafsson multiple and multi-faceted projects and as standing firmly against the greedy, capitalist order of music business that sterilizes creativity and individuality; for suggesting a better alternative - one that shares, open-hearted, communicative and conscious. And Fire, referring to his fiery dedication, playing in an intense and passionate manner, as serious as his life (following his hero Joe McPhee's solo album title, HATology, 1996. McPhee borrowed the title from Valerie Wilmer book from 1977).
Andrew Choate, who wrote the illuminating liner notes, emphasizes that the keyword of this festival was “primal”. The insistent raw and primal force that pervades the music of Gustafsson, but also the sense of ancient, essential, communal activity. Gustafsson, in his notes, insists that it is all about sharing - the music, beliefs, ideas - “open communication and interaction in free collective group settings”, adding in his opening statement of the festival that “this is the music we need in these times and in future times”. But Choate has a point. As he concludes his notes: “Gustafsson’s music embodies that desperate guttural need to speak and communicate when we don’t even know what language is, and he creates a new language for us”.
The festival took place on October 26-28, 2014, and featured solo or duo performances dedicated to Gustafsson in the upper smaller hall of Porgy & Bess and larger outfits on the bigger stage, downstairs. The first three discs in this remarkable box-set document each the performances of every night at the larger space, while the fourth documents the one from the upper hall, all together more than four and half hours of music. This box also offers two booklets with insightful photos of Slovenian photographers Žiga Koritnik and Petra Cvelbar.
Disc 1: The first night began with a hyper rhythmic and muscular short free improvisation of Gustafsson and Austrian drummer Didi Kern, titled “Peace” and “Fire”. Both fed each other with surprising, eccentric ideas, pushing each other to the extremes. The Austrian duo RISC - electric bass and electronics player Billy Roisz and turntables master dieb13, followed with an abstract, almost ethereal drone-based soundscape dedicated to the “Birthday Boy”. Legendary Swedish drummer Sven-Åke Johansson, a seminal influence on young Gustafsson (check the trio Gush with Johansson, Tjo och Tjim, Dragon, 1990), followed with three short solo pieces, dadaistic in spirit, drumming on the first one on phone books with sticks, rubbing on the second soda lids on his drums heads and concluding with a song: “I Didn’t Know What Time it Was”.
Gustafsson closed the night with his Swedish Azz quintet, dedicated to an updated interpretations of Swedish Jazz classics, and featuring tuba player Per-Åke Holmlander, vibes player Kjell Nordeson, dieb13 on turntables and drummer Erik Carlsson. Swedish Azz played with a characteristic reverential disobedience, introducing to the classics pieces of Lars Gullin, Bo Nilsson and Jan Johansson excerpts from Albert Ayler’s first recording, since Swedish drummer Sune Spångberg played on it, and a riff taken from Quincy Jones piece, because he had a Swedish wife.
CD1-1 –Mats Gustafsson, Ddkern Peace
Drums – Ddkern
Saxophone, Fluteophone – Mats Gustafsson
6:39
CD1-2 –Mats Gustafsson, Ddkern Fire
Drums – Ddkern
Saxophone, Fluteophone – Mats Gustafsson
2:17
CD1-3 –Risc (2) Birthday Boy
Electric Bass, Electronics – Billy Roisz
Turntables, Klopfer – Dieb13
8:41
CD1-4 –Sven-Åke Johansson Part Of Klingend Und Festgehalten
Toms, Voice, brushes, Cymbal, Snare – Sven-Åke Johansson
9:38
CD1-5 –Sven-Åke Johansson I Didn't Know What Time It Was
Toms, Brushes, Voice, Cymbal, Snare – Sven-Åke Johansson
2:09
CD1-6 –Sven-Åke Johansson I Cover The Waterfront
Toms, Voice, Cymbal, Snare – Sven-Åke Johansson
2:30
CD1-7 –Swedish Azz Lidingö Airport
Drums – Erik Carlsson
Fluteophone, Saxophone – Mats Gustafsson
Tuba, Cimbasso – Per Åke Holmlander
Turntables – Dieb13
Vibraphone – Kjell Nordeson
6:05
CD1-8 –Swedish Azz Quincy
Drums – Erik Carlsson
Fluteophone, Saxophone – Mats Gustafsson
Tuba, Cimbasso – Per Åke Holmlander
Turntables – Dieb13
Vibraphone – Kjell Nordeson
4:08
CD1-9 –Swedish Azz Du Glädjerika Sköna
Drums – Erik Carlsson
Fluteophone, Saxophone – Mats Gustafsson
Tuba, Cimbasso – Per Åke Holmlander
Turntables – Dieb13
Vibraphone – Kjell Nordeson
4:59
CD1-10 –Swedish Azz, Sven-Åke Johansson Mäster
Drums – Erik Carlsson
Fluteophone, Saxophone – Mats Gustafsson
Tuba, Cimbasso – Per Åke Holmlander
Turntables – Dieb13
Vibraphone – Kjell Nordeson
Vocals – Sven-Åke Johansson
8:38
