The Squid's Ear Magazine


Stemeseder, Elias: Piano Solo (Intakt)

A solo album from Austrian-born, NY-based pianist Elias Stemeseder, a member of the Jim Black Trio and Dre Hocevar, here presenting 14 original compositions, succinct works of inventive structures and insightful improvisation along with a traditional Austrian tune "foeggslia'l", an album revealing great skill, quick wit, and a complex mind that yields delightfully intrepid discovery.
 

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Elias Stemeseder-piano


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UPC: 7640120193775

Label: Intakt
Catalog ID: ITK377.2
Squidco Product Code: 31787

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2022
Country: Switzerland
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold 3 Panels w/ booklet
Recorded at SWR Studio Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, on June 16th, 17th, and 18th, 2021, by Alfred Habelitz and Toygun Kirali.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Born in 1990, pianist Elias Stemeseder has become a creative force of contemporary jazz in recent years. Based primarily in New York since 2015, the Austrian-born pianist has made a name for himself in a wide variety of advanced improvisational contexts. Up to now, Stemeseder has been content to work as a sideman, though all those familiar with his work in the Jim Black Trio will know that he is a musician of remark - able skill, flair and imagination. His diverse playing ranges from songoriented to contemporary classical pieces to electronic music.

His spirit of discovery leads him into different musical realms and thanks to his great empathy for the respective musical idiom, his piano playing always captivates with authenticity. Deeply rooted in the tradition of jazz and equipped with a fearless passion of experimentation, he distinguishes himself on this solo album as a profound pianist with a sovereign will to create. He is an inventive improviser whose playing sparkles with complexity and conceptual verve. On Piano Solo, Stemeseder skillfully plays with structures and moods and presents an album that is laden with surprises and bursting with ideas. "Stemeseder is a deeply mature musician with an abiding sense of inner reflection. That interior mindset is clear on this dazzling album," writes Peter Margasak in the liner notes."-Intakt Records



"Pianist Elias Stemeseder, Austrian-born and New York-based since 2015, is ready-in 2022-to release his first album under his own name. Piano Solo is something he might not have taken on. He considers himself still a student. If not for the encouragement of Intakt Records' Florian Keller, this album may not have happened. The pianist has contributed, most notably profile-wise, with his work in drummer Jim Black's trio and his playing with reedist Anna Webber and Philipp Gropper, and percussionist Christian Lillinger.

Stemeseder put his diffidence aside in June, 2021, entering the studio with a bunch of frameworks for improvisation. The results reveal an artist with a sprawling imagination taking on an array of conceptual constructs and creating a cohesive sound over the course of fifteen concise tunes. And diffident or not, he has crafted a bold music, agitated. fierce, thoughtful, searching, teetering on an introvert/extrovert tightrope.

And his music has passion. He sounds as if he is spearing small, agile fish with his rapid fire piano notes on "Foeggslia'l" before tapering the intensity down into a sweet, inward reverie. At nearly seven minutes, this is the longest piece on the set. Here, and elsewhere, Stemeseder uses repetition nicely, weaving in the ominous and molding unsettled segments of sound with serenity and pure beauty.

With solo piano, what we get-when the endeavor is successful-is a revelation of the artist's heart, mind and soul. It happens here. A few spins of Piano Solo says that Stemeseder is a wonderful combination of fragility, drive, and unwavering tensile strength and talent, brimming with a sense of wide-eyed and fearless adventure."-Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz


Artist Biographies

"Elias Stemeseder: Born in Salzburg, Austria in 1990, Elias lived in Berlin from 2010 and moved to New York in 2015. Besides his main instrument, the acoustic piano, he also plays synthesizers. He performs in a variety of musical idioms ranging from the song-oriented music of Jim Black's trio to contemporary classical pieces by John Zorn to the electric music of Eyebone.

Current projects include collaborations with John Zorn (John Zorn's Bagatelles), the Greg Cohen Quintet, Philipp Gropper's "Philm", Jim Black's "Malamute" Anna Webber's "Percussive Mechanics", Robert Landfermann Quintet and "OTIS+WEDDING".

Elias Stemeseder has performed solo concerts at the Nuoro Jazz Festival (IT), Haus Der Berliner Festspiele (DE), 12points Festival Dublin (IRL) and Südtirol Jazzfestival (IT). He leads a Berlin - based quartet with Eldar Tsalikov, Igor Spallati and Ugo Alunni and co-leads the bands Jagged Spheres (with Anna Webber and Devin Gray) and Eyebone (with Nels Cline and Jim Black).

Since 2008 Elias has been working extensively with the American drummer Jim Black. The Jim Black trio (with Thomas Morgan on double bass) has released the critically acclaimed recordings Somatic and Actuality on the German label Winter&Winter Recordings and The Constant on the Swiss label Intakt Records. In 2013, Elias formed the collective trio "Eyebone" with Jim Black and guitarist Nels Cline, in which he plays the Wurlitzer piano and bass synthesizers.

Elias has received scholarships and grants from SKE/austro mechana and BKA Österreich Kunst und Kultur."

-Elias Stemeseder Website (http://eliasstemeseder.com/)
3/25/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Anthropocene 6:49

2. Tau 0:56

3. Lem-Botanik I 3:54

4. CC/Choral 4:28

5. Minustone I 2:03

6. Nonspirituals (etch) 1:58

7. Dswearegsd 1:00

8. Rekursiv 1357 Closing 2:22

9. Foeggslia'l 6:55

10. Lem-Botanik II 2:48

11. Luft 2:05

12. Rekursiv 1357 Opening 1:01

13. Minustone II 0:33

14. Nonspirituals (teer) 3:21

15. Ter 2:49

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Jazz
Free Improvisation
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Piano & Keyboards
Solo Artist Recordings
Staff Picks & Recommended Items
New in Improvised Music
Friends of Squid

Search for other titles on the label:
Intakt.


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