Druga godba 2025: Mari Kvien Brunvoll & Stein Urheim with Moskus

Mari Kvien Brunvoll (vocals, electronics, percussion, zither) / Stein Urheim (vocals, guitar, flute, electronics) / Moskus: Anja Lauvdal (vocals, piano, synthesiser, harmonium, electronics) / Fredrik Luhr Dietrichson (bass, cello, vocals) / Hans Hulbakmo (drums, percussion)

As soon as Mari Kvien Brunvoll stepped on stage for the first time, she was immediately hailed as one of the biggest Norwegian talents in years. Vocally there’s nothing she can’t do – something that Druga Godba was quick to realise when it invited her to appear at the 2011 edition just as she was starting out. You better believe that her return has been worth waiting for.

This time round she’ll be appearing as part of a five-piece band that came together for Branches & Limits, a work commissioned for the Vossajazz festival in Norway in 2023. That concert thrilled critics and audience alike with its directness, and its unusual combination of written material, spontaneous improvisation and musical expression. The music, written by Mari and Stein and then developed in collaboration with the Moskus trio, takes an open-minded and improvisational approach to the interplay of the known and the unknown. Although these musicians are part of the wider context of Norwegian jazz, they have put genre to one side for this project to create a wholly new, independent musical landscape that even the sharpest eyes and ears will have trouble pinning down. You might, for just a second, wonder whether they’ve created this music with the sole aim of playing at Druga Godba. However you frame it, last year’s debut album, Barefoot in Bryophyte, is balm for the ears – but you won’t quite know how it’s going to make you feel until the joyous quintet take to the stage.