JON BALKE / SKRIFUM     ECM2839

Jon Balke: piano, Spektrafon

Norway’s Jon Balke proposes a new sonic dimension with Skrifum, continuing a line of inquiry begun with Warp (2016) and Discourses (2020), solo piano albums which also processed the acoustic environment in which the music was heard. Skrifum, however, takes things a step further, as is apparent from the outset. Where the piano music of Discourses was threaded with subtly collaged ‘field recordings’, like subliminal messages from the outside world, Skrifum is more self-contained, a deeper journey into the sound-universe of the piano itself.

Balke’s newest solo music is made with the aid of electronic audio tool the Spektrafon, live processing software which he helped develop together with technology professor Anders Tveit at the Norwegian Academy of Music. Using this interface, Balke is now able to directly manipulate ambient audio sound from the piano in real time – pulling out frequencies and sustaining them as chords of harmonics, showers of sparkling overtones, or eerie drones. Activated and energized reverberation thus becomes new material for improvised interaction and dialogue, often with quite beautiful results.

Skrifum means “write” in Icelandic and, for all the technological sophistication employed, there is an almost calligraphic quality to the melodic lines and sounds that Balke carefully shapes along the way: writing, drawing and designing the music in the changing light and lengthening shadows cast by the processed material.

“The Spektrafon’s sound feeds back in ways that demand space,” says Jon Balke. “So I take that opportunity to play mostly monophonically and to focus on every single note and its weight and position in the soundscape.”

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Balke, who made his ECM debut with Arild Andersen’s group on Clouds In My Head in 1975, is widely acknowledged as one of Scandinavia’s most resourceful musicians, working across the idioms as pianist, keyboardist, percussionist, composer, arranger and improviser in contexts from solo performance to leader or co-leader of widely-divergent ensembles. These have included the transcultural Siwan group, inspired by the poetry of Al-Andalus, the percussion unit Batagraf, chamber ensemble Magnetic North, the ‘little big band’ Oslo 13, and the improvising trio Jøkleba (with Audun Kleive and Per Jørgensen). Balke was a founder member of Masqualero, alongside Arild Andersen, Jon Christensen, Nils Petter Molvӕr and Tore Brunborg, and has also appeared on ECM recordings with singer Sidsel Endresen, trumpeter Mathias Eick and percussionist Miki N’Doye. He has composed numerous works for jazz groups and contemporary music ensembles, and written music for film, theatre, ballet, and collaborations with visual artists. As a sideman he has played with Archie Shepp, Jon Hassell, John Surman, George Russell, Enrico Rava, Airto Moreira and many others.

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Skrifum was recorded in November 2023 at Village Recording in Copenhagen, edited at Bavaria Musikstudios in Munich, and produced by Manfred Eicher and Jon Balke.