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Ingi Bjarni Skúlason: Farfuglar

By Chris May
January 4, 2024
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Appropriately enough for an album on NXN, a subsidiary of classical label Naxos, which only relatively recently diversified into jazz, the Icelandic pianist Ingi Bjarni Skúlason's Farfuglar spans both traditions. Is it classical? Is it jazz? Both? Neither? Check the YouTube below and decide for yourself.

Whatever it may be, Skúlason's music is definitely cerebral, a quality which it shares, perhaps coincidentally, but probably not, with other releases on NXN. One thinks in particular of Norwegian saxophonist

Anders Lønne Grønseth

saxophone, tenor
b.1979

" data-original-title="" title="">Anders L?nne Gr?nseth's absorbing Outer View (2022) and Inner View (2023), on which Gr?nseth sets out to reforge the overarching theoretical construct of his music much as

George Russell

composer / conductor
1923 - 2009

" data-original-title="" title="">George Russell did with his Lydian Chromatic Concept Of Tonal Organization or, more recently, the New York-based saxophonist

Oded Tzur

saxophone, tenor

" data-original-title="" title="">Oded Tzur has done with his Middle Path. Skúlason has yet to articulate his aesthetic as ambitiously as Russell or Tzur, but stay tuned.

On Farfuglar, Skúlason leads a quintet composed of the same musicians with whom he recorded the similarly cross-border album Tenging (Connection, 2019): Norwegian trumpeter

Jakob Eri Myhre

trumpet

" data-original-title="" title="">Jakob Eri Myhre, Estonian guitarist

Merje Kägu

guitar, electric

" data-original-title="" title="">Merje K?gu, Swedish double bassist

Daniel Andersson

bass, acoustic

" data-original-title="" title="">Daniel Andersson and Norwegian drummer

Tore Ljøkelsøy

drums

" data-original-title="" title="">Tore Lj?kels?y. Unlike most "jazz," but like most "classical," much of the recorded material was scored: the liner credits say that all nine tracks were composed by Skúlason and arranged by the quintet. The tunes are spasmodic yet lyrical and characterized by themes and sub-themes which are passed back and forth between piano, guitar and trumpet, or played consecutively in unison by different pairings of those three instruments. There is little extended improvisation and, much of the time, little swing. But the end result is strangely compelling.

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Track Listing

???ing, Bj?gun á d?gun, ?a? sem er, When Holiday Really Begins, Farfuglar, Knowing Without Knowing, A? fljúga, Loftin blá, Mamma engill.

Personnel

Ingi Bjarni Skúlason

piano

Merje K?gu

guitar, electric

Jakob Eri Myhre

trumpet

Tore Lj?kels?y

drums

Daniel Andersson

bass, acoustic

Album information

Title: Farfuglar | Year Released: 2023 | Record Label: NXN Recordings

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