Christian Wallumrød Ensemble - Kurzsam And Fulger [Hubro Music Promo]

Another fresh one released via the Norwegian label Hubro Music is "Kurzsam And Fulger" , the new album by Christian Wallumrød's performing group named the Christian Wallumrød Ensemble. And this one comes as a surprise in comparison to other label releases we've reviewed so far as the albums opener "Haksong" comes across as a pretty much light-hearted, pleasant and positive take on repetetive, loop-based Jazz music sporting sweet shakers, brushes and most importantly a coaxing piano phrase that reminds us of warm and lazy late summer days. Following up is "Fulgsam", a stripped down 155 seconds affair relying on multiple triangle or glockenspiel layers only that add up to a quite calming effect whilst "Langsam" provides a rich menu of comforting melancholia contrasted by a contrary alignment of distant, hollow sounding drums that are defo far off any given track or tempo predetermined by the tunes melodic section. In "Phoniks" we see the group creating a deep, slightly haunting and well foggy Ambient atmosphere like the one one might find in nature when roaming through age-old, untouched forests, "Klafferas" brings in thrilling, repetetive, clattering drum sequences of quite abstract nature that, despite being created without the help of any electronics, might be well suitable for those following labels like Raster Noton and other imprints gravitating towards musical abstraction, before "Arpsam" focuses on the unquestionable beauty of pure piano romanticism, accompanied here by scattered, kinda mechanical sounding percussions and, towards the end of this 11 minutes journey, by unsettling trumpet experiments. Finally we've got "Kurzsam Und Onward", offering a remarkable hard piano phrase we've surely heard before, probably in Wallumrød's involvement in the Trondheim Jazz Orchestra, and, as a great juxtaposition,  periods and sequences of near silence as well as small micro fractures of the original phrase popping up here and there. So if contemporary Jazz is something you're into - check this one out!   

Album artwork on Instagram!