The Lars Danielsson Liberetto ensemble has assembled a distinctive body of work over its four previous albums. That development and continuity derive from his core partners for over 15 years, drummer Magnus Ostrom (Esbjorn Svensson Trio) and UK guitarist John Parricelli. They were joined in 2017 by Martinican pianist Grégory Privat, who replaced original member Tigran Hamasyan).
With Echomyr, bassist Danielsson continues to carve out a singular musical path, drawing on his classical roots and folk-influenced melodic ideas as a platform for jazz explorations. His consummate use of space allows him to make a complex melody feel effortless and inevitable. Across 10 tracks, his compositions show his focus on melody and his attention to detail. He explains,…
Tag Archive: ACT
For their sixth album, What We Are Made Of, Shalosh turn their focus inward while extending the scope of their sound. The music reflects the trio’s shared history, shaped by years of collaboration and extensive touring, and draws on the influences and impulses that have gradually formed their collective musical language.
“From the very start of Shalosh, we have always said that we would never commit to any one genre but keep our music as open as possible,” drummer Matan Assayag says. “It’s the best way to bring ourselves fully to each song and the only way to stay truly authentic.” In more than a decade since its founding, the trio has made its signature this freewheeling, energetic and deeply-felt blend of jazz improvisation with…
Since the release of his ACT debut Letter to the Universe (2023) and its follow-up Highlife (2024), Ghanaian-born trumpeter Peter Somuah, now based in Rotterdam, has established himself as a bridge-builder between cultures and continents. “An excellent musician and jazz at its most international,” notes the BBC. For the globetrotting Peter Somuah, musical influences from geographically distant cultures are always just a step away. This is precisely what his new album Walking Distance is about.
Walking Distance is an exploration of musical unity — a journey through diverse genres that, despite their differences, remain deeply interconnected. The album blends elements of post-bop jazz, Arab music, Latin grooves, blues,…
The long-awaited return of Norwegian saxophonist and composer Marius Neset arrives in an expansive big band setting, a format that underscores both his ambition and his growing confidence as a large-scale orchestrator. Known for music of formidable complexity, Neset here introduces a more openly festive dimension, without sacrificing the structural rigor that has long defined his work.
Few could have predicted such an outcome when Neset was five years old. At that age, the future saxophonist was handed a drum kit, an early encounter with rhythm that would quietly shape his musical thinking. That grounding remains audible today. Whether writing for a jazz quintet, a symphony orchestra, or, as here, a big band that often sounds closer to a full…
The album title Circadia reflects themes of renewal and change rooted in the cyclical patterns of life. For the English trio Mammal Hands, change is the keyword: this sixth release marks a significant step in their evolution. Their move to the ACT Music label represents a notable shift, one that may broaden their visibility while giving fresh impetus to their musical independence.
Equally significant is the arrival of new drummer, Rob Turner, formerly of GoGo Penguin, who joined the band following the departure of Jesse Barrett in 2024. Turner brings heavier beats to the band’s signature blend of hypnotic jazz, post-rock and folk, pioneered by the two constants in the lineup, brothers Nick Smart on piano and Jordan Smart on saxophone.
Nils Landgren marks his 70th birthday with Love of My Life — an album that reflects not only the scale of his achievement, but also the astonishingly wide range of roles his life in music has embraced. As one of the most successful European jazz musicians of the past few decades, Landgren has long been more than a trombonist or singer: he is a connector, a mentor, a bridge-builder. Recorded with close friends and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra under the opulent arrangements of Vince Mendoza, the album spans from Landgren’s own tender compositions to reimagined works by Cat Stevens, Leonard Bernstein, Herbie Hancock, and others — yet it remains unmistakably Landgren: open, warm, and full of humanity. “The most important thing in music for me is:…
Since their founding in 2012, the vision string quartet has stood out for its genre-defying approach and fearless flexibility — performing classical repertoire from memory, composing its own works, and blurring boundaries between classical, rock, jazz, and minimalism.
In the Fields is the young quartet’s bold return — their ACT debut and first recording in five years. It’s a single, choreographed journey that fuses the spirit of folk, the pulse of dance, and the depth of classical tradition into one seamless arc.
Inspired by Béla Bartók’s Fourth String Quartet and its dramatic five-movement form, the album reimagines the string quartet as a living, breathing band — one that thrives on improvisation, rhythm, and fearless experimentation.
Vocalist Viktoria Tolstoy and pianist/keyboard player Jacob Karlzon have worked together as close musical companions and friends for nearly three decades. So, when they choose to call their album Who We Are, it is far more than just an album title: they are making a statement.
What they are offering is a kind of musical self-portrait. They are aggregating and celebrating their shared experience and their mutual trust. Theirs is the kind of artistic language which only emerges after two people have been resonating on the same frequency for years. This duo’s journey began in the mid-1990s during one of Tolstoy’s UK tours. Since then they have performed together again and again, recorded six albums together, including Letter to Herbie (2011),…
It’s been clear since she first emerged that German pianist Johanna Summer is an extraordinary soloist and virtuoso. But none of her work to date has really resonated beyond the ”wow what an incredible classical technique” dimension until this latest. Perhaps the classical strictness of her style took time to get used to. Her jazz affinity is clearest here. Perhaps she is more of a classical player than a jazz one. Perhaps, perhaps, a lot of these perhapses are still valid.
However there are fewer maybes about this well curated selection on a very still and gathered solo piano album that revels in simplicity.
…‘Giant Steps’ is done more as an étude and you could say that about a lot of what’s here. Its extreme slowness is in a way a statement.
Most jazz records are recorded in studios with perfect acoustics. Ours was recorded in a French château surrounded by vineyards. And the acoustics were perfect too.
The atmosphere was as rich and complex as the best wines of the region – an incomparable setting for a jazz session. Morten Lund, Kaisa Mäensivu and I – each an artist in our own right – had never been on stage together before that day. And yet it clicked at that moment. Under the high ceilings of the castle, surrounded by old wine barrels, we reached into the Great American Songbook and pulled out something fresh, vibrant and new.
We love these melodies. They’re like perfect little stories wrapped up in 32 bars. The jazz standards are our roots.
By any measure, Dhafer Youssef is a rare figure in modern music, a Tunisian-born oud virtuoso who has built bridges between Arabic traditions and global jazz, between spiritual contemplation and contemporary sound. Yet even for longtime followers of his work, his new release comes as a surprise. For the first time, Youssef has joined the acclaimed German label ACT, a move that feels both inevitable and long overdue.
Artists from ACT’s roster, bassist Chris Jennings and guitarist Nguyên Lê among them, have been close collaborators for years. Hearing Lê’s lyrical, electric phrasing entwine once again with Youssef’s haunting voice feels like a reunion of kindred spirits rather than a mere session partnership. Their interplay brings depth to…
Trumpeter Theo Croker’s recent releases present his fluency and warmth as appealing flavours in a bed of studio-crafted hip-hop and R&B. Jazz is in the mix, but mostly limited to a few brooding phrases and occasional pithy bursts. Sullivan Fortner remains best known for his immaculate piano accompaniment and wide stylistic range — collaborators include Wynton Marsalis, Paul Simon and vocalist Cécile McLorin Salvant. The two now combine for Play: an exquisite, jazz-rich, equal-partners trumpet/piano duet that showcases their superb sonic control and grasp of mood.
The original project, based on a selection of covers, was recorded, and discarded, all in the same day. “It felt very stale,” said Croker, or in Fortner’s words “more like being in school”.
Bugge Wesseltoft’s solo piano album It’s Snowing On My Piano (1997) is one of the most successful albums that the ACT label has ever released. For many people – especially in Germany and Norway – this music, made with such care and love by the affable and generous-spirited Norwegian, has become an essential part of their holiday season. And yet, for a Christmas album, it is anything but typical. From the very first note, the meditative strength of the music is palpable. Wesseltoft creates a locus of peace and tranquillity – a state of being which seems even more precious today than it did when the album first appeared. In the intervening years, Bugge Wesseltoft has played the music from the album many times in concert. Each time, he reinterprets the music…
…Listening to Living Being IV: Time Reflections, we are immediately struck by the range of dynamics, the intimacy and extroversion at play in every detail, the rich textures, and the arrangements that allow for riveting moments of surprise. It’s worth remembering that, from the outset with Living Being, Vincent Peirani brought to the fore the concept of chamber music: a small number of performers, with each one playing a unique part, but with the emphasis on the collective rather than the individual.
From the start, with ‘Le Cabinet des énigmes’, the melodic intelligibility is impressive. A sort of children’s song sublimated by the art of superimposing transparencies. Everything is played out in a myriad of details that create…
Lumen is the deeply personal and introspective new solo album by pianist and composer Bill Laurance. Recorded in the stillness of night inside an empty church, the album captures a rare and intimate moment of communion between artist, instrument, and space. Though not religious, Laurance describes the experience as almost spiritual—guided more by the music itself than by his own intention, as if he were merely a vessel.
At its heart, Lumen explores the delicate balance between composition and improvisation. Some pieces follow meticulously crafted scores, while others are entirely spontaneous, born in the moment. It’s in the space between these two worlds, Bill Laurance suggests, that the true magic of music lies.
Pianist David Helbock and bassist/cellist Julia Hofer have things in common: a playful curiosity combined with the urge to try out new things and to have fun. Both of these Austrians are also perfectionists…and natural communicators…and that’s why their musical combination works so well. “I was looking for a new duo partner,” says David Helbock, “because although I am completely passionate about my ‘Austrian Syndicate’ project, it’s a really tricky thing to put together, a large band…lots of keyboards. Together with ACT CEO and producer Andreas Brandis, the idea of an acoustic duo reduced to its emotional essence was finally born – a format in which musical communication works more directly than in any other line-up. And I quickly came…
With “ok”, his new album and ACT debut, French trumpeter ‘daoud’ offers a quiet manifesto – a record shaped by contrast and contradiction, by collapse and the stubborn act of beginning again. Built around the idea of accepting what cannot be changed. He explains: “The whole record is built around the concept of reluctant acceptance of things that you can’t control. All right, fuck it, fine, I guess.” The album explores failure, loss, repetition, and the soft absurdity of pretending everything’s fine. Across 14 tracks, daoud weaves tragedy and humor, chaos and tenderness, melody and noise into a rich and emotionally charged soundscape.
At its core, “ok” is a jazz record treated like anything but a jazz record. The foundation of…
The more new discoveries you make, the more you go back to the beginning,” observes pianist Vincent Meissner.
The music on his third album, Eigengrau, is characterized by an inward gaze, by his reflections on experiences and encounters that have been meaningful to him. Together with his working trio, Josef Zeimetz on bass and Henri Reichmann on drums, Meissner has developed his own language, drawing inspiration from artists such as The Bad Plus, Esbjörn Svensson, Vijay Iyer – and his mentor, Michael Wollny.
“The word ‘Eigengrau’ describes a state of darkness behind closed eyes,” Meissner explains. “But once you rub your eyes, you see patterns. Everyone sees something different: structures,…
Four unique top-flight European jazz pianists, each with limitless freedom of expression. Limitless joy too for the audience in the completely full main hall of the Philharmonie Berlin. But perhaps there is also something even more im-portant here: music’s unique power to unite people.
It was this intense magic that brought the Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic series into being. At the first concert in 2012, there were three pianists: Iiro Rantala, Michael Wollny, and Leszek Możdżer. It all started as a one-off experiment, a specially curated jazz concert at the classical music temple, the Philharmonie Berlin. But that was just the start: this unique series of concerts and recordings has gone from strength to strength.
More than a decade later, Rantala, Wollny, and…
Three continents, three musical world citizens. Morocco-born Majid Bekkas, Franco-Vietnamese Nguyên Lê and American Hamid Drake have combined their astonishing musicality, their origins and their global experiences to create a captivating live concert programme encompassing desert blues, Gnawa trance, Middle Eastern jazz, sixties rock and Far Eastern serenity.
Voice, oud and guembri (bass lute)…electric guitar with a wide spectrum of shimmering timbres…a percussion arsenal between subtlety and physicality – these are the tools deployed here by three remarkable, world-class, globe-trotting protagonists… Majid Bekkas’s innovations have cast a wholly new light onto the fascinating music and culture of the Gnawa minority in…