Bookshelf

I just ordered a book from the Nordic online bookstore Adlibris and was happily surprised by their work for the climate.

If you pay only 10 Swedish crowns extra (a little over 1 U.S. dollar) your package is delivered climate neutral, which means that they compensate for all carbon dioxide pollution caused by your shipping. A great initiative and I hope many will follow their example. From now on this will be my online bookstore.

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1. Finally back online!

Christmas Eve, and our last calendar window. We’re ending with the weirdest jazz clip I have ever seen.

Snow Lantern. Photo by: Lohlih.

For those of you not in to jazz this one might be a bit hard to grasp, but to explain, all the music in the video are very famous jazz standards. We get to hear songs like Now’s The Time, Blue Monk, Sister Sadie, Doxy, Donna Lee, Cherokee, Fables of Faubus, ‘Round Midnight & St Thomas + a few more. Hilarious! I wish I could understand what the story is.

I would also like to take the opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas. I’ve had a very nice day with the family gathered, lot’s of food and lot’s of laughter, the way it should be. Now the house is empty and silent again and I’m filled with the calming feeling of peace inside. I hope you all have a very peaceful and soothing night, let’s hope we can keep this feeling and take it with us into 2010. This world needs it more now than ever I think.

Merry Christmas everyone!

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1. Bill Cosby on jazz drumming

Michael Jackson Honour Concert Poster

November 13th, 2009. Fasching in Stockholm completely sold out. 16 musicians on stage. Everyone there for the music of one man: Michael Jackson.

I love the music of Michael Jackson and I’m honored that I got the chance to take part in a tribute concert to him at Fasching in Stockholm. Playing this night was amazing! Fasching was completely packed with people, the spirit in the audience and in the band was unbelievable and we had such a good time playing!

Unfortunately not everyone who wanted to see the concert could, since it was completely sold out, but hopefully there’ll be more chances in the future.

The goal of the concert was to play the music of Michael Jackson as true to the original as possible, with all sounds there. Not an easy task, his music is full of small details and I think I have never worked as much before a concert as we did before this one, everyone transcribing every little detail of the recordings. I’m glad we did though, because the result was truly amazing. Here’s a show reel from the concert, which I think captures the whole thing pretty well! Enjoy!

On stage:

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1. The gig at Stockholm Concert Hall

Right now I’m sitting on a bus from Stockholm, heading for my hometown Mjölby. The bus has comfortable leather arm chairs, wireless network and wall sockets at every seat. Bus4you is the bus company, best trip home ever!

This post is not about buses though, it’s about something much more important: Todays calendar window is a Christmas gift from our band Jerry the Cupboard. We recorded some music at SAMI in Stockholm back in September, and today I have uploaded it to the Jerry the Cupboard section of the music page. For your convenience I’ve also included the player in this post.

The music of Jerry the Cupboard is written by saxophone player Thomas Backman, who is also the leader of the band. You can read more about the band on the music page or on the Jerry the Cupboard Myspace. Hope you will appreciate the music!

Jerry the Cupboard is:

Thomas Backman – alto saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet & baritone saxophone, Jens Filipsson – alto saxophone & baritone saxophone, Clas Lassbo – accoustic bass, Calle Rasmusson – drums.

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1. Jerry the Cupboard at Glenn Miller Café tomorrow!

We did a great gig with Neighbourhood in Uppsala yesterday and afterwards we took a christmas photo for our friends.

Neighbourhood Christmas Card

Thanks to everyone who came to listen, and thank you Club Hijazz for being such nice hosts, we loved playing at your club! Now we’re taking a break over christmas, and in january we finish mixing the upcoming album.

Have a listen to the song Husvalla Bygata, recorded live in concert at Jazz Club Fasching in Stockholm a few months ago. This was also my debut as a flute player!

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1. Recording session with Neighbourhood tomorrow

Ahmir Khalib Thompson, better known as Questlove or ?uestlove, is the drummer of the hip hop group The Roots. You might think that a Questlove Top 4 will be a list of my top 4 favorite recordings, but that’s certainly not the case.

Questlove

Questlove is one of my favorite drummers and he has for sure influenced most hip hop and R’n'B drummers out there. Apart from playing with The Roots, he’s been working with many of the biggest soul and R’n'B acts. He’s also a producer and has produced artists like Common and D’Angelo.

As I stated earlier, I’m not gonna list my favorite records where he appears, instead I’m gonna make a list of 4 great Questlove moments. Feel free to add your own in the comments of this post! Here we go!

#4: The Roots at Berns, Stockholm

To be honest with you, I wasn’t sure if I should put this one on the list. The reason for this is that I wasn’t there. I know, shame on me, but I think I had a gig that night. Anyway, I have friends who were there and they have told me about it, and this is why i decided to put it on the list. You can see it as a good warm up for the other three. Here goes:

The concert is about to start, and all lights are out. All of a sudden you see a flashlight moving on stage, my friends think it’s a stage technician taking care of something. The flashlight makes a stop at the drum set, and is then switched off. Then the magic begins. For a few minutes Questlove (in case you haven’t guessed already, he was maneuvering the flashlight) plays a simple, heavy groove and according to my friends it doesn’t get any better than that. Him alone on stage playing a bad ass drum groove. I believe them.

Later this concert, Questlove gets up from his drum set and walks up to the front of the stage. He pulls out his Afro pick comb, always tightly secured in his fro, grabs a pen and start signing it. The crowd goes crazy and waits for him to toss it out. Instead of throwing it though, he fixes his hair up a bit, puts it back in his fro and walks back to the drums. That’s star quality right there!

#3: Dave Chapelle – White People Can’t Dance Sketch

I discovered comedian Dave Chappelle a few years ago, and really like his stuff. This sketch is one of my favorites, and the best part, Questlove is in it! Enjoy!

#2: Questlove shopping in Stockholm

Questlove Designed Nike Sneakers

Questlove has a passion for sneakers, and he actually got the chance to design a pair of his own, which you can see on the right. Number two on the list relates to this passion, more precisely to a visit in a sneakers store in Stockholm.

Swedish newspaper DN På Stan also made a list last week, 100 great, funny and memorable Stockholm moments 2001-2010. (full list in Swedish) Here’s #67 on the list:

The Roots drummer ?uestlove walks into the store Sneakersnstuff on Åsögatan during one of the bands’ Stockholm visits. ”Show me all your size 14’s!”, he says. The staff dig out almost every pair of size 14’s in stock. ”I’ll take ’em!”, he says. In total, 34 pairs of shoes.

I just love this story, makes me wish I would have been there to see it. I wonder how he managed to bring them all back to the States?

#1: The price is right failure horn

Alright, time for number one! I’ve been following Questlove on Twitter for about a year now, and he really is active there, twittering a lot. Of all his tweets I’ve read, I have one favorite in particular.

I have tried to find the tweet in question, but since he has written almost 12.000 of them, it’s hard. It’s not a problem though, what he wrote was something similar to this:

A friend of mine split up with his girlfriend and his Facebook page now states “is not in a relationship anymore”. Of course I had to comment with this:*
(*see video)

This is exactly my kind of humor, and that’s why this one’s number one on the list. Here’s, according to Questlove, what to play for your friends when they brake up with their girlfriends:

So there you have it, my Questlove Top 4 Moments list! Have any moments of your own? Share it in the comments section below!

The Erykah Badu – Live album is embarrassingly enough an album I discovered pretty recently. I’m really glad I did though.

Erykah Badu - Live

While working on my new page design, I’ve been listening to a lot of good music on Spotify. Brad Mehldau, Kurt Rosenwinkel and Lee Kontiz to name a few of the top played ones. After doing a search on Erykah Badu though, I discovered an album with her that I had not heard before: Erykah Badu – Live. After finding it, I didn’t listen to anything else for a couple of days.

I saw Erykah Badu live for the first time at Stockholm Jazz Festival this summer, one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to and one of the true highlights from the festival. Hearing this album kind of takes me back again, since they really have managed to capture the live feel and the atmosphere of the concert on the album.

Live records are my favorite type of albums, it’s so great to be able to hear the interaction between the artist and the audience. Take the audience response to this amazing line of the song Tyrone for example:

Now everytime I ask you for a little cash, you say no but turn right around and ask me for some ass.

It’s also nice to hear how they play everything live, with eventual flaws still there. In this case the band backing her up is so good it’s ridiculous. Have a listen to the album, you won’t be disappointed.

Listen on Spotify:

Erykah Badu – Live

Related posts:

1. New music!

After many late nights and many hours spent, my new website design is finally done! I like it very much, and I hope you will too!

I have to apologize for the lack of updates in the advent calendar these last days, but I’ve been under a deadline with the completion of the site, since I’m planning to use it as a showcase for a job I’m applying for. Wish me luck!

About the page

New design

I wanted to have a bit more open feel to it than my old site did, and tried to remove all elements that felt unnecessary. I got rid of the sidebar, both on the pages as well as in the blog, which hopefully makes all pages less cluttered and more content focused. Instead I’m placing all complementary content in the footer of every page, and alter the content of the footers depending on which page you’re browsing.

In the blog I’ve aimed for a bit of a magazine article feel to every post, something I’ve seen around lately, and is a way of structuring everything that appeals more to me than the traditional blog layout. I think it’s easier to navigate now, and with less content cluttering the page, I hope browsing and reading will be more enjoyable.

Since I’ve changed the structure so much, it will take me a while to update all old blog posts, so I hope you can bare with me while I’m taking care of that. At least I have something to do during Christmas holidays…

I hope you will enjoy the new page as much as I do, feel free to look around and see if you can find the surprise I’ve got for you. A hint is to try the menu items!

I would love to hear what you think, so if you need a reason to try out the comment form below, that’s a good one. If you find any bugs, please tell me, it’s hard to test a website in all different web browser out there.

Related posts:

1. New design

Today we open a double window, this because I was to busy to post yesterday. A double window of course means double pleasure, and in this case two videos from saxophone player Joshua Redman.

Joshua Redman - Compass

First off, a video from the rehearsals of his Double Trio for the support gigs of his latest album Compass. The clip features Joshua on the tenor saxophone, Brian Blade together with Gregory Hutchinson on drums and Larry Grenadier together with Reuben Rogers on bass. What a lineup! For a jazz nerd like myself it’s pretty cool to see a rehearsal and watch them work with the material.

In the second video Joshua talks about the making of the Compass album. Also interesting, gives a broader view of the record.

Listen on Spotify:

Joshua Redman – Compass.

YouTube:

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1. Joshua Redman

I’m sorry that todays advent calendar window is opened a bit late, but I had a gig which I consider to be a valid excuse. Anyhow, since it’s late in the night, what could be more suitable than a peaceful track signed by the great trumpet player Dave Douglas.

Dave Douglas - The Infinite

They do a cover of the song Poses by Rufus Wainwright, which appears on one of my favorite Dave Douglas records named The Infinite. It’s one of those tracks that always makes me calm inside, the sound of Dave’s trumpet mixed with bass clarinet, acoustic bass and fender rhodes really set a special mood.

After hearing Dave’s recording I also had to check out Rufus Wainwright’s original, and found it was the title track of his record from 2001. His original is very very beautiful as well and I think I’ll have to listen more to him in the future.

Listen on spotify

- Poses the Dave Douglas way
- Rufus Wainwright’s original

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1. Jerry the Cupboard Christmas music