Jazz Finland Live

Ville Lähteenmäki: bass clarinet and flute
Nicolas Leirtrø (NO): double bass
Trym Saugstad Karlsen (NO): drums

Ville Lähteenmäki Trio is a Trondheim-headquartered group consisting of young Finnish and Norwegian jazz musicians: Ville Lähteenmäki (bass clarinet, flute), Nicolas Leirtrø (double bass) and Trym Saugstad Karlsen (drums). In the band's music, you can hear echoes of the freejazz/spiritualjazz pioneers of the 1960s and 1970s, whose powerful and expressive playing have been a great source of inspiration for Lähteenmäki. Ville Lähteenmäki Trio released their debut album "Introducing: Ville Lähteenmäki Trio" on Tampere's Ultraääni Records in July 2022, which received excellent reviews. The band, founded in the spring and winter of 2022, has already received record international interest, as evidenced by performances at festivals and concerts in Italy, Norway, Estonia, Sweden and Finland (e.g. Südtirol Jazzfestival, Raahen Rantajatsit, Tampere Jazz Happening). The trio is currently working on their second album, which will be released in the spring of 2024.

Photo: Erik Egge Jordheim

The concert is supported by the Finnish-Norwegian Foundation, City of Helsinki, Svenska Kulturfonden, The Finnish Music Foundation and The Arts Promotion Centre Finland (Taike).

Tickets: 20/15/12/30 €.

Open event

Open event

Tickets 20 €

Soul What? feat. Joonatan Rautio is a super-energetic and virtuosic soul/jazz quintet from Finland. Soul What? has released two albums "What Lies Ahead" and "The Silver Lining" and in 2023 they will release their third album.

Intensive live energy, shrilling improvisations, soulful vocals and explosive drumming is what audience around Finland have experienced on the groups past gigs. Soulful singer/pianist Mikael Svarvar, intuitive and explosive drummer Toni Porthén, inventive guitarist Martin Söderbacka and powerful bass player/bandleader Eevalotta Matikainen form Soul What?

Their repertoire consists of own original music, both vocal pieces and instrumental tunes. Together with one of Finlands foremost jazz musician and internationally appreciated saxophone virtuoso, Joonatan Rautio, the group offers you music you won't soon forget.

Open event

Open event

Tickets 20 € / 11 € / 8 €

Founded in 2016, Tuomas Paukku Scription represents a strong and unique vision in contemporary Finnish jazz.
The devoted quartet interprets the original and atmospheric music composed by bandleader and guitarist Tuomas Paukku.

The ensemble bases its style on modern jazz impressionism and post-bop, but also finds new nuances and viewpoints to its music outside of jazz. Paukku's inexhaustible interest in music is clearly evident in the band's output. The beautiful mountainous atmospheres and cyclical moods of Scription's music have captured the interest of music lovers across genre boundaries.

Tuomas Paukku Scriptions second album will be released in October 2023 accompanied by a record release tour in November.

Open event

Showtime: 19:00, Doors: 18:00
Tickets: €39, presales at kukkesand@hotmail.com

In an extraordinary evening, the accomplished Pakistani musician Ustad Noor Bakhsh will grace the stage, playing the Baloch folk music tradition with virtuosity on his unique Benju instrument. The event will also feature the renowned cult artist Jimi Tenor and jazz drummer-percussionist Ilmari Heikinheimo's Freelektron duo.

FREELEKTRON

Formed in 2016, Freelektron has performed in various events, clubs, and festivals in Finland under the name Jimi Tenor & Ilmari Heikinheimo Duo. Their music merges the possibilities of jazz and electronic music, heavily relying on improvisation. The band's sound is enhanced by a larger drum-triggering system, making them sound like a larger ensemble.

In the spring of 2020, the band released their debut album Freelektron through the Norwegian Jazzaggression label.

USTAD NOOR BAKHSH

Noor Bakhsh hails from Balochistan, Pakistan, a region along the Indian Ocean coast, near the borders of Iran and Afghanistan. He plays a unique stringed instrument called the Benju, equipped with an unconventional keyboard. The instrument originally comes from Japan and was initially a toy called Taishōgoto. Noor's electric Benju includes a microphone, channeling the sound into a vintage Philips amplifier discovered in a Karachi marketplace 30 years ago.

Upon hearing rumors of this masterful musician, ethnomusicologist Daniyal Ahmed embarked on a journey to find Noor. Their meeting led to the on-site recording of Noor's impressive debut album using just two microphones as the sun set in the background. The album titled Jingul was digitally released under Ahmed's own honiunhoni label, and it received praise from international music media. The vinyl version of the album, set for September 15th release, will be published through the UK-based Hive Mind Records.

Back home on the Indian subcontinent, Noor unexpectedly became a viral sensation, an unusual feat for someone who doesn't own a smartphone or even have access to the internet. His repertoire includes Persian and Kurdish melodies that predate the current borders of Iran and Pakistan. In a recent recording session, he even included an Arabic ghazal, an ancient form of love poetry.

Noor Bakhsh's renditions of popular and folk tunes, sung in all of Pakistan's major languages, showcase his unique style and original compositions. For those unfamiliar with Balochi music, the electrified sound of Noor Bakhsh's Benju and the ornamentation of melodies bring to mind Ali Farka Touré's style, and the rhythmic sway invites movement akin to the music of both Eastern and Western Africa.

Europeans are fortunate, as this year Noor Bakhsh has embarked on his inaugural concert tour here, with appearances in festivals such as Roskilde and Amsterdam Folk Roots.

Open event