Jazzfest Berlin 2025: Signe Emmeluth // David Murray Quartet // Makaya McCraven

She has introduced another facet of her art with the suite “BANSHEE”, a wildly disparate piece that implants heady spells of improvisation within a structural framework that’s wonderfully hard to parse. The superb line-up draws from different corners of Norway’s musical map, with the legendary vocalist and noisemaker Maja S. K. Ratkje and new music percussionist Jennifer Torrence colliding with noisy experimentalist bassist Guro Skumsnes Moe and mercurial tubist Heiða Karine Jóhannesdóttir Mobeck.


18:30

• Signe Emmeluth: “BANSHEE”
  
• (DK, LV, NO, US)
  
• German premiere
  

Emmeluth draws on the tales about the titular figure from Irish mythology to ask questions about this life and what we want from it. The music ricochets all over the place, careening between ritualistic rhythmic workouts, brittle free improvisation, war whoops, chamber music and more, cagily eluding easy categorization. Emmeluth has genuinely carved out her own sui generis sonic world. A recording of the work was awarded the prestigious Spellemannprisen (Norway’s GRAMMY equivalent), but this performance marks the German premiere of the piece, which also includes keyboardist Guoste Tamulynaite and trumpeter Anne Efternøler.


Line-up

• Signe Emmeluth – alto saxophone, electronics, voice, composition 
  
• Guoste Tamulynaite – piano, synthesizer, voice 
  
• Jennifer Torrence – percussion, voice 
  
• Guro Skumsnes Moe – electric bass, double bass, voice 
  
• Heiða Karine Jóhannesdóttir Mobeck – tuba, electronics, voice 
  
• Anne Efternøler – trumpet, voice 
  
• Maja S. K. Ratkje – voice, electronics, violin 
  

20:00

• David Murray Quartet: “Birdly Serenade”
  
• (ES, US)
  
• German premiere
  

One of jazz’s grand masters, veteran reedist, bandleader and composer David Murray evolved into his prolificacy and fruitfulness has never dimmed or ebbed over five decades. He arrived in New York at the peak of its Loft Jazz scene, but he quickly became the face of an exciting new generation straddling the divide between tradition and the avant-garde. His tunes were informed by the music’s rich history, whether the gospel shouts of Albert Ayler or the buoyant joy of Sidney Bechet. Murray’s writing is rooted in post-bop, with melodies steeped in the soulful infectiousness of classic R&B.

 

In recent years he’s recaptured the spotlight with two very different bands, including an edgy trio with the fiery Norwegian rhythm section of Paal Nilssen-Love and Ingebrit Håker Flaten. But tonight Murray’s excellent American quartet – with bassist Luke Stewart, drummer Russell Carter and pianist Marta Sánchez, who leads her own trio Thursday night at A-Trane – can be experienced on stage. Earlier this year the quartet released the avian-themed “Birdly Serenade”. The title tune, with silken vocals from guest singer Ekep Nkwelle, sounds like an instant jazz standard, but it’s Murray’s voice as a soloist that’s most arresting, as he unspools vibrant lines that slash, glide and soar.



Line-up

• David Murray – tenor saxophone, bass clarinet 
  
• Marta Sánchez – piano 
  
• Luke Stewart – double bass 
  
• Russell Carter – drums 
  

21:30

• Makaya McCraven
  
• (FR, US)
  

Chicago drummer and bandleader Makaya McCraven has been a key figure in a new wave of music rooted in jazz, but which spills well outside of its boundaries. His broad aesthetic still embraces improvisation and composing in real-time as central tenets of his work, but McCraven refuses to be contained by the limitations imposed by stylistic gatekeepers. His ascent has run parallel with the Chicago label International Anthem, which likewise rejects stylistic purity, preferring to work with musicians possessing its holistic sensibility. On “In These Times”, his most recent album for the imprint, he used the studio to peer back into Black music’s past, particularly the kind of symphonic work by folks like Charles Stepney at Chess Records and Curtis Mayfield, melding jazz and 70s R&B with a symphonic richness, albeit with a fresh rhythmic thrust informed by hip-hop.

The drummer’s breakthrough came on his 2015 album “In The Moment” where he culled groove-oriented improvisations, donning his producer’s hat to build indelible concoctions colliding modern studio techniques with feverish live sessions. The process has given him a variety of vantage points in how he creates music, whether building tunes from improvisation or constructing sophisticated arrangements from studio blueprints. Jazzfest Berlin looks forward to hear what McCraven’s nimble quartet – with trumpeter Marquis Hill, guitarist Matt Gold and bassist Junius Paul – have developed in the three years since he dropped “In These Times”.


Line-up

• Makaya McCraven – drums, electronics
  
• Junius Paul – electric bass
  
• Matt Gold – electric guitar
  
• Marquis Hill – trumpet