Hans Kjorstad – Vendingo utta'om råket
Catalogue number: MOT4LP
Release date: August 30th 2019

Motvind Records is releasing compositions by violinist Hans Kjorstad.

Vendingo utta'om råket (english: «Turns out of the track») is a title that refers to the composers tendency to taking walks on and out of forest tracks, and it also tells something about the episode-like, or cinematic if you will, experience of the record as a whole.

«The album broadly consists of melodies that I have whistled or hummed while walking in the forest, along streets or across fields and other open landscapes. I have then arranged the melodies for the quartet and tried to put it into a form» says the composer.

The music was made during a 5-year period filled with all kinds of music for Kjorstad. After having Haltli, Thelin and Johansen as teachers at the Norwegian academy of music in Oslo, the work was premiered as his bachelor exam concert in June 2017. The record that now exists consists of a revised version of that music, and was recorded in Studio Paradiso by Marcus Forsgren. One should not deny that there is a certain gap in both age and experience between the young violinist and the other performers on the record. The composer wishes to send a respectful thanks to the three listening, down-to-earth and exceptional musicians he has with him:

Frode Haltli has through dead serious contemporary music, traditional music from different corners of the world, ECM-records, the trio Poing and countless other projects found his very own way where is is gallopping over notated and improvised distances with the greatest musical surplus.

Virtuoso Håkon Thelin is showing great broadness in his expression throughout the record. Everybody knows that he can play advanced notated music, but he is also a serious improviser and deep listening musician, simply an enchanting bassist!

A lot of people's favorite percussionist Per Oddvar Johansen plays, as usual for his part, with crystal clear presence, unpredictable ideas and firm beat. Kjorstad is, as many other Norwegian musicians and composers, informed by compositional techniques, harmony and expressions in the music of pianist and composer Christian Wallumrød, and Johansen has played with Wallumrød since the quartet Airamero, the trio Close Erase as well as on all the 6 records by Christian Wallumrød Ensemble.

The record is released digitally and on vinyl in 100 copies. Kjorstad has hand printed the vinyl sleeves where the motif on the front cover and the text on both the front and back cover is carved out in wood.

DETAILS
Line up: Hans Kjorstad: violin, compositions, printmaking; Frode Haltli: accordion; Håkon Thelin: bass; Per Oddvar Johansen: drums and vibraphone
Recording and mixing: Marcus Forsgren (Studio Paradiso)
Mastering: Audun Strype