Hardly anything could be further away from the traditional ”theme-solos-theme” jazz structure than Nik Bärtsch’s Mobile. The Swiss pianist’s holistically minimalistic thinking charmed the audience, when he visited Happening with his electric ensemble Ronin. Founded already in 1997, Mobile is a totally acoustic quartet that plays “ritual groove music”. That apt description is also the name of the band’s new album.
Born in Zurich in 1971, Bärtsch took piano and percussion lessons early on continuing his studies at the city’s Music University. At the same time he played “everything from fusion to free funk and all kinds of extroverted jazz”. The lure of the latter diminished, when Nik got into John Cage’s and Morton Feldman’s musical ideas. That’s why Mobile nits a slowly developing and quite meditational polyrhythmic mat, the charge of which can reach rather dramatic heights.
Tickets are sold on Piletilevi.