3 October 2007

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On the 19th the group returned to Stockholm for a concert at the Glenn Miller Cafe. This was the first time I’ve performed at the club in years, and it was very good to be back. Free Fall was in peak form on that night, we knew the material inside-out, and were pushing each other to really explore the edges of what the trio is all about, both on the tunes and with the improvisations. Luckily, the Swedish Radio was there to catch the performance, recording it to be broadcast later this autumn. In conjunction with all that good fortune, the audience was truly exceptional- wall to wall with all kinds of people there to listen and find out what this music is all about. Each set escalated the level of intensity, and everyone at Glenn Miller that evening shared a great and unique experience. What the radio captured by recording the music will be just half of the feeling in that room while we were playing, but for those who couldn’t be there it will be a sonic view into what really happened. As great as it is to perform for such a receptive crowd, there is a special pleasure to playing a concert when musicians you really respect are in the audience. Both Magnus and Fredrik were listening all night, their enthusiasm for the music Free Fall is dealing with and how we play was more than icing on the evening’s cake.

The next morning I got up early to take some photos along the street by Glenn Miller, some nice images to try and capture. Then to the plane with Ingebrigt and Håvard in order to fly back to Oslo to drive to a gig in the town of Bø. The landscape was of the countryside extraordinary. I wandered about after checking into the hotel to take some photographs and look at one of the most incredible skies I’ve ever seen. Afterwards, the concert turned out to be very tough. So far all the audiences had been right with us from the first note, here it was a another story, and not assisted by the fact that the club kept playing the same three song promo of a “jazz” singer over and over and over and over and over, before and after our sets- it seems they needed to keep running the recording as a way to promote her upcoming show. It may take a lifetime to get those damn songs out of my head… For me it felt like we were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but I did whatever I could to find a way to play something worthwhile while watching the indifferent faces at the table directly in front of me.

After packing up and getting back, we decided to hang out in the hotel lobby while watching the academic staff, in training for the university in town, slide down a route that always ends with everybody in a conga line. While there harmonica driven festivities continued our talk ran through various fronts until the power had went out in Bø, literally. For some reason the woman at the front desk kindly hunted up some candles for us to use in our rooms. As she struggled to light them while we stood in the pitch dark hallway, the thought that this could be developing into a major fire hazard was suddenly interrupted by a professor storming out of his room in his underwear shouting at us at the top of his lungs to “SHUT THE HELL UP!” We all stood there in surprise partially illuminated by the candles as if we were in some kind of Norwegian version of a Hammer horror film, but then couldn’t help ourselves and we proceeded to laugh ridiculously, “We’re trying to get these candles lit, try and calm down.” Furious, he slammed his door in our faces in post-conga disgust. Of course, the lights came back on as soon as we opened the doors to our own rooms.

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