Circle of Chimes Marius Neset with Lionel Loueke, Ivo Neame, Petter Eldh, Anton Eger & Jim Hart

• 1 Satellite 09:15
• 2 Star 12:06
• 3 A New Resolution 08:47
• 4 Introduction to Prague's Ballet 02:49
• 5 Prague's Ballet 05:47
• 6 Life Goes On 05:53
• 7 Sirens of Cologne 08:22
• 8 The Silent Room 07:44
• 9 1994 11:44
• 10 Eclipse 05:14
• Total Runtime 01:17:41

Info for Circle of Chimes

The 32-year-old Bergen-born saxophonist-composer Marius Neset has been at the height of his creative powers, especially on the evidence of a trio of consecutive albums released since 2014 on ACT, one of Europe’s leading jazz recording labels. He’s been keeping good company too. Aligning with other internationally-renowned, kindred spirits working at the borderline between jazz, improv and classical music, Neset released Lion in 2014, originally a ‘live’ commission in collaboration with the celebrated young Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, and collected a Norwegian Grammy award (Spellemannprisen). Last year he released Snowmelt, a project with the 19-piece London Sinfonietta, another highly esteemed European orchestra at the cutting-edge of 21st century genre-bending new music. In 2015 his quintet album Pinball received an unusual five-star rating from The Guardian writer John Fordham who described Neset as, “one of the hottest European jazz talents of recent years.” As a saxophonist, Neset has been instrumental in reinvigorating the post-70s fusion ‘big tenor’ tradition of Michael Brecker, Chris Potter and Jan Garbarek, contrasting his dazzlingly ferocious technique with a soulful spontaneity. But it has been difficult to separate Marius Neset the saxophonist Marius Neset from the composer. He’s been hailed as one of the most exciting and ambitious composers of the younger generation of innovators on the European jazz scene today. On the new release Circle of Chimes, he again takes a spectacular leap forward in redefining the role of composition in the contemporary jazz and improvising world.

“This album is more personal to me than any other album I have made,” he says. “A lot of things were changing in my life and that was inspiration for the ideas on the album. It’s the darkest, most melancholic album I have made so far, even if it has lots of brighter moments on it as well.” Neset turns again to the personnel he employed on Pinball, a quintet featuring the UK’s understatedly eloquent Phronesis pianist Ivo Neame and French-based percussionist/ vibraphonist Jim Hart, Neame’s fellow Phronesis drummer Anton Eger and Swedish double bassist Petter Eldh, both of whom Neset studied with at the Copenhagen Rhythmic Music Conservatory, under the inspirational tutelage of Django Bates (an influence very much apparent on the new recording). To this first-rate cast, Neset adds the stellar Benin-born Herbie Hancock/Terence Blanchard guitarist Lionel Loueke who brilliantly adapts his unique African-jazz vocal scat and angular funk, effected guitar to Neset’s compositions. His sister-flautist Ingrid Neset and the cellist Andreas Brantelid as well make a vital contribution to the recording.

Neset says, “it´s about eight musicians that have an equal role in the music. It was great to work with Lionel. I thought about his sound and voice when I was composing, how he could add his very unique and distinctive playing to fit this music. Andreas Brantelid on cello is a very unique musician too. His way of phrasing and shaping the lines I had written for him is so musical.”

At key moments, Circle of Chimes features the ring of tubular bells that’s referred to in the album title, giving the recording a haunting almost cinematic Ennio Morricone-like air. Neset explains its significance. “What became the ‘main idea’ for the whole album, which is clear yet sometimes quite hidden, is the tubular bells that it opens with. I was sitting for hours by myself in a kind of a trance or a meditative state playing just the same note in octaves. I found out it was interesting when one of the notes moved just a bit, so in the end I had worked out a pattern that was kind of a circle of these two notes, so that in the end they would meet again. This was later transformed into the tubular bells, and this pattern became important in more pieces such as ‘Life Goes On’. It’s one of the things that connects the songs. Another idea with the bells was to ring in the New Year.” Indeed the Circle of Chimes project originated in late 2014 when Neset was asked to compose music for a New Year’s Day Concert at Kölner Philharmonie in Cologne. The premiere took place in 2016 in front of an audience of 1500, and was recorded in the next few days in a studio in Copenhagen. Says the saxophonist: “Although this music is a New Year’s Concert originally, it doesn’t open in a bright, celebrating New Year kind of way; it opens very dark. But then I felt like opening it up gradually, so the first two tracks ‘Satellite’ and ‘Star’ are gradually becoming brighter.” ‘Star’ is a delirious yet entirely cohesive mix of avant-sax jazz rock, post-Zawinul world-jazz and chattering Zappa-esque melodies. In contrast 'Prague's Ballet' is a wonderfully mellow chamber classical-jazz piece featuring the leader in wonderfully lyrical mood on soprano sax. Says Neset, “The street where I was composing it in Copenhagen was called Prague’s Boulevard. I remember I heard some music by Mozart one evening, and that made a big impact on me. When I closed my eyes I got pictures from a ballet in my head.”

By seamlessly as well as organically linking the worlds of composition and jazz improvisation, Marius Neset’s Circle of Chimes offers a kaleidoscopic wide-angle lens on the state of contemporary art music. It’s arguably his most striking compositional statement to date.

Marius Neset, tenor- and soprano saxophone
Lionel Loueke, guitar, vocals
Andreas Brantelid, cello
Ingrid Neset, flute, piccolo, alto flute
Ivo Neame, piano
Jim Hart, vibraphone, marimba, percussion
Petter Eldh, double bass
Anton Eger, drums, percussion

Recorded 2nd - 4th January 2016 by August Wanngren at The Village Studios, Copenhagen
Mixed by August Wanngren at Virkeligheden
Mastered by Thomas Eberger at Stockholm Mastering
Produced by Marius Neset

Marius Neset
was born in 1985, in Bergen, a sleepy Norwegian harbour town that’s home to the internationally renowned Nattjazz Festival (Neset won the Talent Award there in 2004). Besides his love of jazz in its widest sense, the saxophonist-composer also grew up listening to bands from the so-called ‘Bergen wave’ of post-rock such as Royksopp (and from there on to Radiohead) through to the great classical composer of his hometown Edvard Grieg as well as more contemporary art music. “I love being in the mountains, and silence is a music as well. Maybe it’s because I’m from Norway I feel this,” he says. It accounts for the huge diversity and fluidity of movement between different elements of so-called genres that’s been a key characteristic of Marius Neset’s music to date.

When only 5 years old, before taking up the sax, he took lessons on drums and this has had a significant impact on his approach to composition in particular. “I think the drums gave me a rhythmic base that was very important. I learnt very young to play in these odd meters so I think I have a very natural feel for it,” he says. Neset, in live performance, also has the uncanny ability of making one saxophone sound like two or three.

In 2003 Neset moved to Copenhagen to study at the Rhythmic Music Conservatory. The great English pianist and large ensemble arranger Django Bates was professor there at the time and became Neset’s mentor. The saxophonist went on to become the star turn in Bates’ student big band StoRMchaser recording a CD Spring is Here (Shall we Dance?) in 2008. Meanwhile Neset also released his debut Suite for the Seven Mountains that year on the Danish Calibrated label. Besides a string quartet, it featured the Swedish drummer Anton Eger, who alongside Neset was also a leading member of Scandi-fusion boy band JazzKamikaze. In 2010 Django Bates took him to London to play at a concert at Kings Place marking his 50th birthday. Neset also appeared as a guest in Django Bates’ long time ensemble Human Chain at the famous Ronnie Scott’s club. Recorded by BBC Jazz on 3 he wowed the audience with his contrast of lightening virtuosity and tender, ethereal lyricism. One of those blown away was Dave Stapleton head of the fast emerging UK independent jazz label Edition Records.

Edition signed Neset to the label in 2011. GoldenXplosion, featuring a quartet that included Django on keys and the Scandi-Brit trio Phronesis’ rhythm section of Jasper Hoiby and Eger, was released to glowing press reviews with The Guardian writer John Fordham accurately predicting Neset would be, “on his way to being one of the biggest new draws on the circuit”. By the time of his second CD on Edition Birds in 2012, Neset had started developing his penchant for larger ensemble music and a widescreen palette of instrumental sound.

Still only 29 years of age, Neset is successfully hitting the international stage, and being talked about as a big tenor in a lineage that extends from the post-bop Americans from Michael Brecker, Chris Potter through to fellow Norwegian Jan Garbarek. But there’s a lot more to one of Europe’s brightest young stars than that. “I’m very inspired by people like Frank Zappa, Django Bates, Pat Metheny and Wayne Shorter where the music and the playing is one,” he has said. Neset’s classy, cohesive composition and arranging skills have come into even sharper focus with a new album Lion released in 2014, his debut for the Munich-based ACT, one of Europe’s leading jazz labels, in a collaboration with the celebrated Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, whose former collaborations have boasted the likes of Chick Corea and Pat Metheny. It was originally a commission to compose for the 13-piece orchestra (in a lineup that includes tuba player Daniel Herskedal, a fellow student at RMC who together released an impressive duo album Neck of the Woods in 2012.) for a concert at the 2012 Molde Jazz Festival. “After the premiere in Molde, these compositions felt so special that we decided to record this album and play many more concerts with it,” he says.

Booklet for Circle of Chimes