Nils Petter Molvaer: An American Compilation

by Chris May
May 31, 2006

In the 35 years since Miles Davis first put foot to wah-wah pedal, any number of musicians have tried to develop the original, shocking impacts of his 1969-74 electric recordings, or even just plain replicate them. (Davis himself tried, with generally disappointing results, throughout the 1980s.)

Current pretenders to Davis' electric legacy include two trumpeters: France's Erik Truffaz and Norway's Nils Petter Molvaer. Truffaz started out promisingly enough, but has recently been subsumed by a bland world-jazz fusion which verges ...

Nils Petter Molvaer: er

by John Kelman
December 15, 2005

With Khmer (ECM, 1997) Norwegian trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer almost singlehandedly introduced a new movement in the electronica-based nu jazz arena that would come to be known as “future jazz." Blending a group approach to improvisation with contemporary sampling and programming technologies, Molvaer creates hypnotic ambient soundscapes with compelling rhythms. Music for the body? Unequivocally. But equally, music for the soul and spirit. Since leaving ECM Molvaer has in some ways become the gold standard against which other ...

Nils Petter Molvaer: Live at Rockefeller Center in Oslo

by Mark Sabbatini
May 23, 2005

A new Ferrari with a bunch of dents is still a pretty nice gift.

Norwegian trumpet modernist Nils Petter Molvaer is offering its acoustical equivalent in an hour-long concert video recently posted free at his web site. It's a large file (291MB) that may frustrate novices trying to save it on their computers, and the video and sound quality are mediocre by professional standards, but the performance makes one overlook a lot of imperfections.

Downloadable music videos apparently ...

Nils Petter Molvaer: Remakes

by Chris May
March 13, 2005

Another manifestation of Nils Petter Molvaer's groundbreaking np3 album--which only last autumn made up the bulk of the material for the Streamer live set--Remakes offers six original tracks in eleven new mixes made by mixologists ranging from bandmembers Rune Arnesen and Raymond Pellicier through established console stars like Bill Laswell and emergent ones like Matthew Herbert.

First off, before assessing the music itself, the presentation of one of AAJ's highly coveted Track Title Awards, for “Axis Of Ignorance," ...

Lars Danielsson: Libera Me

by John Kelman
October 19, 2004

When the bonus track on an album is the most adventurous piece, you know there might be trouble. And that's not to say that bassist Lars Danielsson's latest album, Libera Me , is bad; it isn't. In a year where we've seen other artists mesh jazz improvisation with an orchestra, most notably pianist Steve Kuhn with Promises Kept (ECM) and Charlie Mariano with Not Quite a Ballad (Intuition), it has come to pass that these two disparate concepts--the obvious demand ...

Nils Petter Molvaer: Streamer: Live

by John Kelman
September 6, 2004

Trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer, surely one of the founding fathers of the Norwegian nu jazz scene, continues to mine the depths of ambient texture with Streamer , a live album recorded in Norway and London in '02. Comprised mainly of material from NP3 (EmArcy, '02), with the exception of the title track from Solid Ether (ECM, '00), Molvaer demonstrates that music can be as much about the fabric of sound as it is more lyrical concerns.

That's not to say ...

Nils Petter Molvaer: Solid Ether

by Chris M. Slawecki
February 1, 2001

Norwegian trumpet player Nils Petter Molv?r captures himself in a swirling electronic nightmare of his own creation on Solid Ether (ECM). A stunning meltdown of classic jazz trumpet styles with modern techno, drum-and-bass and electronic music, Solid Ether continues and expands the stylish deviltry of Khamer, Molv?r’s debut as a leader for ECM in 1998. Khamer claimed awards in Norway, Germany, and “Jazz Record of the Year” from “The L.A. Times.” This challenging, inventive follow-up does not disappoint.Molv?r ...