Hakon Kornstad - Out Of The Loop [CD]

JAZZLAND

£10.80

Cat. no: 3779349
Format: CD
Barcode: 0687437793493
Release Date: 26th February 2021
Genre: Jazz

Hakon Kornstad, a shining jewel in the Jazzland roster, brings his unique skillset to the fore on ‘Out of the Loop’.

Recorded during the 2020 pandemic lockdown in Sofienberg Church in Oslo, the album carries the listener through many textures across its tracks, often sounding electronically created - yet all sounds are generated by saxophone, or are provided by Hakon’s rich tenor voice. The Flutonette - essentially a flute with a saxophone reed mouthpiece - also makes appearances, further diversifying the sonic palette, as does the kalimba.

The opening of “Waking Arp” (a pun on “Waking up”) carries a haunting yet postive vibe, and sets the cool tone for the album as a whole. The looping figures Kornstad creates are not only hooks to ground the compositions, but carefully constructed springboards for harmonic variation, layered counterpoints, and improvisations. The other tracks include “Bremen” (named for the city) is a shuffling slice of coolness, again sounding as though there is a bassist in the mix (no - still just Hakon and his sax).

The CD edition and second disc of the double vinyl, features a highly anticipated reissue of material from Kornstad’s previous albums, appearing for the first time on vinyl. These tracks span a timeline of ten years, and demonstrate how Kornstad’s approaches to looping have grown and matured.

‘Out of the Loop’ offers us a record of a musician-singer-composer who is clearly in a golden period of productivity and development in his career.

Tracks: Waking Arp / Petrus / Dewey Number / Sibelius / Bremen / Strut / Nakai / A Movie That Never Was

LP 2: Oslo (Out of the Loop Edition) / Plystre (Out of the Loop Edition) / Noir (Out of the Loop Edition) / Sansula (Out of the Loop Edition) / Damascus (Out of the Loop Edition) / Pearlfisher (Out of the Loop Edition) / Flutter (Out of the Loop Edition) / Sweden (Out of the Loop Edition)