It all started with the band’s debut album “Tunnel Visions” in 2018 Ark Noir. The title sounded so programmatic for their “Electronic Alternative Experimental Jazz” that the three band masterminds – saxophonist Moritz Stahl, drummer Marco Dufner and bassist Robin Jermer – then gradually made it the brand of a concert and festival series and now also a label made.
Everything from the point of view of dissolving the borders between electronic music, pop and experimental music, between live concert and club night, between improvisation and composition, but also between academic and practical perspectives on music. The label can now host the second “Jazz Summer Week” this year in the underpass design. Which results in a kind of mini-festival between August 8th and 12th. After all, different musicians from the Tunnel Visions cosmos perform on each of the five evenings.
The founders make the start themselves. Come as usual Ark Noir as an actually normal quintet – alongside Stahl, Duffner and Jermer Basti Pfeifer on the keyboards and Tilman Brandel on the guitar. Of course, their music sounds anything but normal. Sometimes rough and gloomy, driven by hypnotic beats and pervaded by haunting textures, cinematic sound worlds are created that you can really let yourself go into. It can’t be ignored that the band is in the orbit of the Jazz rush big band (Stahl is still their lead saxophonist today). Ark Noir are their dark, synthetic side, so to speak.
Lyrical sound spectrum: the trumpeter Angela Avetisyan.
(Photo: Olaf Dankert)
The three musicians who the Tunnel Visions organizers have put together to form a real power trio especially for this summer week also come from the jazz frenzy cosmos: the trumpeter Angela Avetisyan, the guitarist (and chief composer of the JRBB) Leonhard Kuhn and the drummer Simon pop. An unusual line-up that leaves plenty of scope for individual tonal development in all registers and diverse timbres. Avetisyan expands her lyrical sound spectrum through subtle electronic alienation. Leonhard Kuhn also enriches the ensemble with his technical know-how. The same goes for the extremely versatile Simon Popp, who has a wide range of instruments and has already demonstrated this in a wide variety of projects Hello Gravity above fazer up to three solo albums.
Between electronic live set and jazz concert: Dani Scheffels.
(Photo: Uli Neumann-Cosel)
Next up is Dani Scheffels. As a multi-instrumentalist who came from a family of musicians and ended up playing drums, he doesn’t see himself as a “drummer-mercenary”, but also as a composer and improviser who experimentally mixes genres and creates his own sound. He tells stories with atmospheric pads and complex beats. In the Unterfahrt, Scheffels presents new compositions of his own in a quintet with Ralph Heidel on saxophone, Tilman Brandl on guitar, Vitalydeu Burtsev on piano and Lorenz Heigenhuber on bass. Located somewhere between an electronic live set and an acoustic jazz concert.
Moritz Stahl calls his solo project Odizouu.
(Photo: Marie Lehmann)
Next, Moritz Stahl presents his quite new solo project Odizouu. With a saxophone, an analog pedalboard that he can operate like a modular system, and an Elektron monomachine synth sequencer, he creates musical fragments that he calls “ambient improvisation & discoveries”. These improvisations form abstract, spherical dream worlds and soundscapes, which are mainly influenced by nineties tracks from labels like Warp or Ninja Tune. The combination with his jazz background provides rhythm and structure. For this evening, Stahl has got support from the Berlin-based musicians Bernhard Hollinger on bass and sampler and Fabian Rösch on drums.
As a companion, Basti Pfeifer dives into avant-garde soundscapes.
(Photo: Georg Stirnweiß)
At the end of the Tunnel Visions week, Beifer (aka Basti Pfeifer) presents his debut album “constant.transition'”: An eclectic fusion of electronic music with strong influences from dubstep, garage and drum’n’bass, enriched with gripping jazz elements. The cross-genre work leads on a journey through dark atmospheres and avant-garde soundscapes with complex rhythmic layers and unusual chord structures. Also accompanied on the album by Wanja Slavin and the singer Enji, Beifer has here Ark Noir at his side, where he now operates the keys alternately with Sam Hylton. And like every evening, the music is complemented by visuals by Marius Jopen.
Ark Noir, Tue., Aug. 8; Avetisyan/Kuhn/Popp, Wed., Aug. 9; Dani Scheffels, Thursday, Aug. 10; Odizouu & Friends, Fri., Aug. 11; Beifer x Ark Noir, Sat., Aug. 12, each 8.30 p.m., Unterfahrt, Einsteinstr. 42, www.unterfahrt.de