Camae Ayewa, vocals, synthesizer; Keir Neuringer, saxophone, synthesizer, percussion; Aquiles Navarro, trumpet, synthesizer; Luke Stewart, double bass; Tcheser Holmes, drums, percussion
(USA)

Over the past years the Philadelphia/New York/DC-based free jazz collective Irreversible Entanglements has taken European audiences by storm. Originally performing as two different ensembles at a Musicians Against Police Brutality event in 2015 (in response to the NYPD slaying of Akai Gurley), the five musicians recognized a shared ethos, and shortly after, assembled as a single unit for an impromptu studio date at Seizure’s Palace in Brooklyn. A statement on their music, from the band: “…we take the stage without a map, navigate the world in deep, telepathic, contrapuntal communion with each other and the histories we’re tapping into, push into the known and unknown, and arrive at the end together.”

This is how we announced the band in 2020, when the pandemic thwarted the Irreversible Entanglements’ appearance at the Jazz Festival Ljubljana. However, on our initiative, they invested a month’s worth of work into making an exclusive video that was exclusively streamed at the festival. Today, the video is available on YT as a reminder of a time when US jazz artists were left without income and audiences without live concerts overnight. But creativity refuses to be caged. The Irreversible Entanglements continue on their wonderful artistic path with album releases (Who Sent You?, Open the Gates), music videos and concerts: making adventurous music beyond genre, both honouring and defying tradition, speaking to the present while insisting on the future.

Jure Pukl, saxophone, electronics; Peter Evans, trumpet; Joe Sanders, double bass; Nasheet Waits, drums
(Slovenia, USA)

Jure Pukl, one of Slovenia’s most prominent and celebrated saxophone players (a Prešeren Fund Award laureate), lived and worked in New York for nine years and recorded numerous acclaimed albums (according to The Guardian’s John Fordham, he is “a rising star of the creative new generation”). Just before the pandemic, Pukl played the US (Winter Jazz Festival) and Europe with an all-star quartet featuring slightly different personnel (here, vibraphonist J. Ross has been replaced by P. Evans).

As a reconfigured line-up, the AnoRoK quartet (an anagram of ‘korona’) returns with its first post-epidemic tour and music that “draws inspiration from the chaos and unrest in present-day sociopolitical situation. In its core, it is based on jazz, improvisation, and contemporary classical music. Enhanced by electronic sounds that mirror the sonic realm we are currently living in, it is a tribute to Earth and us, its inhabitants.”

Weather permitting, the meeting point for the performance will be on the west side of Cankarjev Dom, in the Council of Europe Park, Prešernova street 10, and we will conclude in the Kosovel Hall of Cankarjev dom. In case of rain, the performance will take place at the Old Town Power Station.

The performance Flock of Experienced Birds takes the viewer on a journey through the city with headphones, with the stories intertwining with the visual landscape of the city scenery, offering both new insights and views as well as new perceptions of urban communities. The roles of observer and listener can instantly transition into a temporary community and upgrade it with their presence. What does it mean to turn over a new leaf in life mean? What is the urban beat like through the eyes of children? Will the swallows return soon? When are we going for a walk by the river again? Why is Europe dying? Do we love our city? How does it develop? A flock of experienced birds reveals the views and memories of all its parts/members, creating a unique story of the city of Kranj in a dialogic coupling. They subtly describe its changing appearance, capture memories and the social pulse of the city, taking place through a first-person profession and revealing the perception of the place and time through subtle talk about change, passing, memories, closeness, interdependence and connection, which at the same time speaks of our own vulnerability.

Ajda Tomazin

graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, University of Ljubljana, and holds a master’s degree in choreography and performance from the Institute for Applied Theatre Studies of the Justus-Liebig University of Giessen. She works interdisciplinary as a designer and choreographer. She authored numerous projects and performances, participated in many creative processes, and works a pedagogue. Her specialty are integrated concepts of the projects, encompassing both choreography and design, and these qualities are inscribed in the original performances, the quality of which is increasingly recognized by the wider international professional public. She received the Ksenija Hribar Award 2019 for outstanding achievements in the field of contemporary dance art.

Julian Lage, guitar; Jorge Roeder, bass; Kenny Wollesen, drums

Hailed as one of the most prodigious guitarists of his generation and “highest category of improvising musicians” (New Yorker), Julian Lage has spent more than a decade searching through the myriad strains of American musical history via impeccable technique, free association and a spirit of infinite possibility. Though only 31, the California-born New York-based musician boasts a long, prolific résumé on his own accord in addition to sideman (alongside such icons as Gary Burton and John Zorn) and duo partner (with Nels Cline, Chris Eldridge and Fred Hersch, among others. Love Hurts – which marks Lage’s third Mack Avenue LP recorded with a trio, and his first to feature bassist Jorge Roeder and drummer Dave King (The Bad Plus) – sees the GRAMMY® nominated guitarist exploring the American song catalog from a truly unique vantage point, performing music written by a range of audacious and original artists, from Roy Orbison to Ornette Coleman, Jimmy Giuffre to Peter Ivers. Lage and his rhythm section build upon the wandering sonic outlook of his previous LPs, further impelling his defining amalgam of jazz fusion, jam band liberation, standards, and embryonic rock ‘n’ roll with virtuosic precision, adventurous improvisation, and a remarkably clear vision.