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Herzog / Muche / Nillesen: Anasynthesi (thanatosis produktion)

"Herzog | Muche | Nillesen is a trio featuring Matthias Muche (trombone), Etienne Nillesen (extended snare drum), and Constantin Herzog (double bass). Their music operates in the liminal space between improvisation and composition, where...
 

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product information:

Personnel:



Constantin Herzog-double bass

Matthias Muche-trombone

Etienne Nillesen-snare drums


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UPC: 7320470274804

Label: thanatosis produktion
Catalog ID: THT043
Squidco Product Code: 36262

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2025
Country: Sweden
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded at Tersteegenkirche, in Cologne, Germany , on October 24th, 2024, by Constantin Herzog. Mastering by Giuseppe Ielasi.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Herzog | Muche | Nillesen is a trio featuring Matthias Muche (trombone), Etienne Nillesen (extended snare drum), and Constantin Herzog (double bass). Their music operates in the liminal space between improvisation and composition, where shifting textures and microtonal structures unfold in slow-motion transformations. Drawing on minimalist, spectral, and extended instrumental techniques, their sound is less about individual gestures and more about emergent sonic phenomena-where the interplay of overtones, resonances, and microtonal frictions creates an immersive, constantly evolving environment.

Their new album, ANASÝNTHESI, embodies this approach both conceptually and sonically. The term "anasýnthesi" (ἀνασύνθεση) is Greek for "recomposition" or "reconstruction"-a process of deconstructing and reassembling elements into new, unexpected forms. This notion is central to the trio's artistic practice: rather than following predefined trajectories, they engage in an open-ended negotiation of sonic material, where structure is a consequence of interaction rather than a guiding principle.

Each musician contributes a unique palette of extended techniques and unconventional approaches: • Muche explores the trombone's microtonal and multiphonic potential, shifting seamlessly between pure tones and complex noise textures. • Herzog subverts the traditional role of the double bass with alternative bowing techniques, detuned harmonics, and spectral-based pitch structures. • Nillesen pushes the snare drum beyond its percussive function, utilizing resonance control and Just Intonation-inspired tunings to unlock its melodic and harmonic capacities.

Through this lens, ANASÝNTHESI is not a piece in the traditional sense, but rather a study in emergent form-a sonic ecosystem where hierarchical distinctions between melody, rhythm, and texture dissolve, leaving behind a music that breathes, shifts, and reorganizes itself in real-time.

Over the years, the trio has collaborated with artists and composers such as Nate Wooley, Sofia Jernberg, Madison Greenstone, Marta Warelis, Anna Webber, Christian Wolff, and many others. While external collaborations have left their mark, their recent focus has been on refining the intricacies of their trio sound-where each player's individual language remains distinct, yet the music unfolds as a collective, continuously morphing entity.

ANASÝNTHESI is as much a process as it is an album-an exploration of unstable structures, frictional counterpoint, and the organic dissolution of form into sound. It is a music of flux, where listening is as much about the transformation of the material as it is about the material itself. "-Thanatosis


Artist Biographies

"Constantin Herzog was born in Wertheim am Main and lives in Cologne. He studied jazz and classical double bass at the College of Music, Würzburg and Cologne, with Detmar Kurig, Dieter Manderscheid and Rudi Engel. As a performer, his work includes improvised music, new music and jazz. He played with Blutiger Jupiter, Sebastian Gramss's "Bassmasse", Pegelia Gold's "Art Zentral" and "Les Polychromes", and the gRoBA Orchestra."

-ZKM (https://zkm.de/en/person/constantin-herzog)
5/28/2025

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Matthias Muche (D) trombone, born in 1972 lives in Cologne and works as musician and media artist. He studied trombone at the Amsterdam School of the Arts, in Rotterdam and at the "Hochschule für Musik" in Cologne with Bart van Lier, Henning Berg and Paulo Alvares and also audiovisual media with Anthony Moore at the academy of media arts cologne. Muche works in several formations, e.g. with the James Choice Orchestra, Das Mollsche Gesetz, Nils Klein Tentett, Schäl Sick Brass Band and with Mischa Mengelberg, Larry Ochs and Robyn Schulkowsky, having concert tours through Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

~~

As media artist, Muche combines contemporary music with new media in his audiovisual works. his latest works were presented in bern, paris and during the Art Cologne. Together with Sven Hahne he has been Artistic Director of the FRISCHZELLE festival for Intermedial Performance since 2004. Furthermore he is founder member of ZEITKUNST, which is an association for the advancement and conveyance of audiovisual art."

-Timeart Ensemble Website (http://zeitkunst.eu/index.php?zone=proj&feld=hots)
5/28/2025

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Etienne Nillesen is an active voice on the European creative music scene, with regular performances across Europe, Asia, America and Africa.

His main focus is improvisation with ongoing collaborations including the trio OGU, and STØY, in which he is exploring all the possibilities of music, playing a snaredrum and a cymbal with all kinds of sticks, toys, bells and bows.

His interest in various forms of exploratory music gave him an opportunity to work with artists as, as well as the opportunity to work with artists such as Claudio Puntin, Philip Zoubek, Sebastian Gramss, Matthias Schrief, Shelley Hirsch, Carl Ludwig Hübsch, Eivind Aarset, Florian Weber, Simon Nabatov, Ernst Reijseger (CN), Tom Arthurs, Robert Landfermann, Bram Stadhouders, Jeroen van Vliet, Udo Moll, Sebastian Duboc, Simin Tander, Frank Wingold, Frederik Köster and Matthias Muche. Beishan International Jazz (CN), Bohemia Jazzfest (CZ), OCT-LOFT Jazz (CN), Women in Jazz (DE), Jazzfest Berlin (DE), The Hague Jazz (NL), Madrid International Jazzfestival (ES), Catania Jazz (I), Caïro International Jazzfest (EG) and clubs all over the world."

-Schraum.DEe (translated by Google) (http://www.schraum.de/en/musicians/nillesen.html)
5/28/2025

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Anasynthesi 33:09

Related Categories of Interest:

In Stock, Not Yet Cataloged

Improvised Music
Free Improvisation
Collective & Free Improvsation
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Trio Recordings

Search for other titles on the label:
thanatosis produktion.


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