Niescier / Reid / Salem // Henkelhausen // Vijay Iyer & Wadada Leo Smith

In the organizer's words:

Alto saxophonist Angelika Niescier, cellist Tomeka Reid and drummer Eliza Salem will open Jazzfest Berlin 2025. Their swinging post-bop enriched with explosive free jazz is followed by the rhythmic depth of Felix Henkelhausen's septet Deranged Particles. The duo of pianist Vijay Iyer and trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith conclude the evening with a set that offers a meditative balm for a world that demands resistance to suffering and despair.

18:00

Niescier / Reid / Salem: "Beyond Dragons"

(DE, US)

Of all the reed instruments on the European continent, few are used with as much energy as that of Cologne-based alto saxophonist Angelika Niescier. Her playing combines the fiery intensity of free jazz with snappy post-bop melodies. Niescier is both a traditionalist and an iconoclast and regularly collaborates with other European musicians such as pianist Alexander Hawkins and saxophonist Sakina Abdou. Over the course of her career, however, she has also repeatedly sought out the proximity of some of the most impressive and idiosyncratic figures on the New York scene, including drummer Tyshawn Sorey and bassist Chris Tordini. Her connection with cellist Tomeka Reid, however, is a very special one.

Reid is a long-time companion of Jazzfest Berlin, having performed here in 2018 with the Art Ensemble of Chicago and returning just four years later with her Hemphill Stringtet. With her robust compositions and masterful vamps, she has taken her instrument to a new level. She drives the improvisations of her bandmates through basslines or sensitive riffs, but is also known as a versatile soloist who can produce melodies of aching beauty as well as weave explosive textures. Niescier's compositions on the two musicians' album "Beyond Dragons", released in 2023 with drummer Savannah Harris, juggle sophisticated unison themes, heated interplay and ecstatic improvisations that feel like a modern, over-the-top answer to Trio Air with Henry Threadgill. For their performance at Jazzfest Berlin, Niescier and Reid will be joined on drums by Eliza Salem from New York.

Line-up

Angelika Niescier - alto saxophone
Tomeka Reid - violoncello
Eliza Salem - drums

19:30

Felix Henkelhausen: "Deranged Particles"

(AT, DE, GB, GR)

Bassist Felix Henkelhausen originally moved from his hometown of Oldenburg to Berlin in 2014 to attend the Jazz Institut Berlin. But it didn't take long for the passionate student to become a fixture on the city's scene. As a technically adept musician, he has become a reliable musical partner for a wide variety of performers thanks to his flair for tradition and his willingness to experiment. That's why none other than drummer Jim Black enlisted Henkelhausen for his current band The Schrimps, in which groove and harmony meet with impressive energy. Although Henkelhausen plays in numerous bands such as the introspective and stylistically open piano trio Fare or with the electronic eclectics of TAU and leads his own quintet, no other project illustrates his compositional versatility and his conceptual strengths as a bandleader as vividly as Deranged Particles.

Henkelhausen founded the band with the intention of devoting himself to pieces that are carried by tricky rhythmic inversions and go beyond the post-bop sound for which he is widely celebrated. The septet consists of a number of musicians from Berlin and Cologne, including tenor saxophonist Philipp Gropper, New York-based keyboardist Elias Stemeseder and vibraphonist Evi Filippou. They support the bandleader in lending a futuristic touch to the music, which is characterized by a complex electro-acoustic timbre and rapid stop-start grooves. The band's idiosyncratic aesthetic follows its very own grammar and makes use of an unheard-of vocabulary. It is the sound language of a future society.

Line-up

Percy Pursglove - trumpet
Philipp Gropper - tenor saxophone
Evi Filippou - vibraphone, marimba
Valentin Gerhardus - sampling, electronics
Elias Stemeseder - piano, harpsichord, synthesizer
Felix Henkelhausen - double bass, composition
Philip Dornbusch - drums, percussion

21:00

Vijay Iyer & Wadada Leo Smith: "Defiant Life"

(US)

When pianist Vijay Iyer was asked by trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith to join the Golden Quartet two decades ago, the collaboration between these two musicians began. Iyer rose to become Smith's partner when they founded their duo, which has now existed for several years and uses musical means to address the pressing socio-political issues of our time. Their second album "Defiant Life" deals with the human condition and explores both human suffering and resilience. Says Iyer: "This recording session was driven by our ongoing grief and outrage at the atrocities of the past year, but also by our belief in human possibility."

The quietly simmering intensity of the music of the two exceptional musicians combines dark, sometimes even threatening harmonies with melodic entries that are bursting with spiritual vulnerability. In a piece like "Sumud", for example, Smith's restrained playing radiates a shattering beauty. The former member of the influential Chicago-based Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) is a composer who has created his own musical universe. He is currently on his latest European tour, which includes this exhilarating project with Iyer, himself one of the most profound and flexible musicians of the 21st century.

As part of his European tour, WadadaLeo Smith will also perform with a new trio at the Pierre Boulez Saal on November 8, 2025.

Line-up

Vijay Iyer - piano, electric piano, electronics
Wadada Leo Smith - trumpet

Price information:

32/42, reduced 20/25