music
Partners in the Hearth quartet, which also features the saxophones of Denmark’s Mette Rasmussen and Argentina’s Ada Rave, a meeting between Susana Santos Silva and Kaja Draksler seemed almost inevitable after a decade of intertwining. Recorded live in the Culturgest auditorium, This Love (Clean Feed, 2015) recorded the first moment between the Portuguese trumpeter and composer and the Slovenian pianist and composer, two of the most interesting and original artists in European improvised music. In 2021, they would meet again on stage, this time at the Copenhagen Jazz Festival. Grow (Intakt Record, 2022) would deserve the highest score for Jazz.pt, which describes it as “an explanation of what improvisation at its best is”.
With pianist Cecil Taylor as a major reference, and on whom he wrote a thesis, Kaja Draksler is an active figure in the European improvised music scene. She founded her main project, Octet, which regularly performs solo or with formations such as Punkt.Vrt.Plastik, but also in a duo with Eve Risser and Onno Govaert. Kaja is interested in finding ways to merge composition and (free) improvisation, working with different musical structures and logic.
Living in Stockholm, Susana Santos Silva has a unique artistic approach. Susana comes from a wide spectrum of influences, from classical and contemporary music to jazz and textural sound art, being interested in extending the possibilities of the instrument, exploring new forms of expression within music, as well as dissolving the boundaries between composition and improvisation. His music has been described as intoxicating, intense, beautiful, oppressive, mesmerising, innovative, daring and creative. He is a co-founding member of the Porta-Jazz Association and its record label, Carimbo, and is part of the European Movement Jazz Orchestra. In 2018 he released his first solo album, All the Rivers (Clean Feed), recorded live at the Panteão Nacional in Lisbon. He has collaborated with musicians such as Fred Frith, Evan Parker, Joëlle Léandre, Mat Maneri, Paul Lovens and Hamid Drake, among many others.
kaja draksler piano and preparations
susana santos silva trumpet and more
