For those unaware, the creative partnership of Anders Jormin and singer/violinist/violist Lena Willemark was first given exposure on ECM in 2004 with the album In Winds, In Light.

In 2015 the bassist and the folk singer-violinist introduced a new project with koto player Karin Nakagawa on Trees of Light. Now, with the addition of drummer Jon Fält, Anders’s long time comrade in the Bobo Stenson Trio, the group has expanded its improvisational range.

Many creative ideas are explored on Pasado en claro, emerging from its juxtaposition of poetry and music. Jormin casts his net wide bringing together texts from ancient Chinese and Japanese sources with contemporary Scandinavian poetry, also setting words by Mexican writer Octavio Paz and by Petrarch, lyric poet of Renaissance Italy.

The resourceful Willemark sings this cross section of world verse and adds her own songs to the programme.

Anders Jormin: When each musician’s unique musical dialect, in curiosity and with open listening ears, blends and communicates, something stronger than our four individual voices may awake. Something happens that in advance is not decided or controlled. The outcome: carefully crystallized and heartfelt music.

1. Mist of the River
2. Blue Lamp
3. Ramona Elena
4. The Woman of the Long Ice
5. Wedding Polska
6. Kingdom of Coldness
7. Angels
8. Petrarca
9. Pasado en claro
10. Glowworm
11. Returning Wave

This organically-embodied, heartfelt and wholly earthy new recording opens on the crystalline gossamer of Mist of the River and then brings us the veritably lucid Blue Lamp, the emboldened Ramona Elena, and then we get brought forth the jarringly discordant, yet artistically creative The Woman of the Long Ice, and the gentle hipsway that ebbs and flows within the more effervescent Wedding Polska.

The shimmeringly melancholic, and aptly-named Kingdom of Coldness is up next and is backed by the thoughtfully-paced Angels, the aching yearn within Petrarca follows, before the recording rounds out on the playful rhythms within the titular Pasado en claro, the upright bass-led Glowworm, closing on the subtle industrialization of melodies within Returning Wave.

Featured artists:
Anders Jormin - Double Bass
Lena Willemark - Vocals, Violin, Viola
Karin Nakagawa - 25-String Koto
Jon Fält - Drums, Percussion

Official Anders Jormin Website

Official Lena Willemark Website