Norbert Stein
PATA GENERATORS
Michael Heupel - flutes
Nicolao Valiensi - euphonium
Joscha Oetz - double bass
Christoph Haberer - drums, wavedrum
The new CD:
“With PATA GENERATORS Norbert Stein manages to combine the trends in contemporary music with the classic beauty of musical traditions to create a colorful and rich picture of modernity … In the new Pata compositions, space is created for the art of improvisation, in which the virtuosity of the musicians can unfold … The musicians draw upon many years of experience in European music, a variety of concert tours throughout all of the continents of the world, and intensive encounters with foreign musical cultures.”
"Silent Sitting Bulls" (Pata 20)
Silent Sitting Bulls - Nondual Action - Paradise Lost - This is You - Quantum Mechanics - Schleuderhonig (Strained Honey) - Miao & Chiao - Hapana Lakini
Press reviews:
A fascinating endeavor
With his various Pata-based ensembles, Stein's music intimates comprehensive manipulations of jazz and world music. Organic, yet equipped with brute force tactics, the saxophonist's compositions boats a native stylistic component …
The respective band members play a vital role in the rhythmic factor and they incorporate a curiously interesting poise that involves world beat pulses intertwined with linear and cyclical unison phrasings. Stein also affords the musicians plenty of room to expand and refresh a given theme. They skirt the free-zone as well, while often venturing into kaleidoscopic patterns, yet the differentiator with Stein's music lies within his broad scope of odd-metered developments and reengineering processes …
Glenn Astarita, All About Jazz
Fresh and invigorated
… it's clear that the time they've spent together has not been wasted. The outcome is an exceptional level of musical coherence, and it's not stretching a point to put their music alongside that of some of Arthur Blythe's ensembles …
Much to offer
… With the emphasis on percussion and euphonium pedal
point, at times the performances resemble those of American alto
saxophonist Henry Threadgill, who has experimented with similarly
constituted ensembles.
… Throughout Stein exposes varied textures and moods with echoes of
Andalusian music, bouncy dance-styled texts and the faint leavening of
Arabic scales …
Reminiscences of cosmopolitan rhythms and dances
The new quartet reveals an unusual, very lovely range of sounds ... it stimulates the imagination in such a honey sweet and melodic way that one can only sigh, thinking back to some lost paradise...
Rigobert Dittmann, Bad Alchemy
A journey across borders, filled with surprises
The pieces span the spectrum between street fairs and street parades full of gags to a club of experienced listeners who enjoy music.
Werner Stiefele, stereoplay
A multifaceted and above all entertaining melange of avant garde and tradition
Whether pan-tonal or in classic harmony, archaic or artistic, the music is always bursting with sensuality and full of enigmatic humor.
Klaus Muempfer, Jazzpages.com
Essential, elemental and moving
Stylistically somewhere between jazz, world music and new music, the four protagonists in PATA, HORNS & DRUMS interweave their voices in sophisticated riffs, short group improvisations and melodies with a touch of something archaic. "Silent Sitting Bulls" is full of surprising twists...
Martin Schuster, Concerto
An individual statement of immense power
The wind players, tonally quite far apart from one another, explore a fascinating mixture... which is added to by the sharp compositions of the band leader that—between circus-like fanfares, African playfulness and nods towards world music and jazz traditions—allow wide leeway for the other musicians to freely contribute.
Rolf Thomas, Jazzthing
New and exciting
The four musicians... step with a tremendous sense of ease and identity into the opportunities that dealing with musical traditions and languages with a free hand has to offer today.
sonic
Stimulating
The signs point to wind music, and indeed there is something clearly reminiscent of circus, fair and brass band music. The sound of the flute, tenor saxophone and euphonium is so heterogeneous in this Pata quartet, the individual voices so independent, that chamber music hits the mark more closely for the wind players.
Berthold Klostermann, Fono Forum
Shining lights and mavericks
Fostering traditions in the consciousness of the modern era, the intersection of tenuous dissonance in improvisational exchange, here and there a hefty incorporation of Duke Ellington and Charles Ives.
Martin Wolterdorf, Koelner Stadtanzeiger
The inspiration of the exotic and its ramifications
Saxophone player Norbert Stein is a cultural interloper between peoples, their music and attitudes towards life. His new quartet is once again tapping improvisation possibilities...
Wolfgang M. Seemann, Passauer Neue Presse
A concert journey in the earth's countries begins
In their new CD, Norbert Stein and his quartet Pata, Horns & Drums draw new borders in music. All the while music tradition transforms into a colorful picture of the modern era...
Joachim Holzt-Edelhagen, Die digitale Jazz-Zeitung
Enough is always possible in this music
Warmth is a quality of sound, not the notes that are played, and the album "Silent Sitting Bulls" by Norbert Steins quartet Pata Horns & Drums allows the source of that warmth to be identified easily; it's the four musicians themselves, the intensity and particular color of their intonation and articulation.
Hans-Juergen Linke, Frankfurter Rundschau
Imaginary music? Yes please!
The power of imagination in Stein's music is also apparent in his approach towards a contemporary musical language... If this could be the cradle for an imaginary music to develop, the quintessence can only be: Yes, more please.
Klaus Huebner, Jazzthetik
Healing jazz that knows no boundaries
The stories are told with a breezy and fleet-footed air. Sentimental, sometimes sappy melodies are taken and stripped down to their bittersweet bones. The three wind players and the drummer work together to open new realms. It's healing jazz that knows no boundaries. It envelops listeners without smothering them.
Reiner Kobe, Jazz´n´More
A compelling cosmos
It is, once again, a compelling cosmos, a journey that offers constant amazement... An extreme challenge for the ears and senses and a coquettish swing in the picturesquely beautiful hammock of musical tradition in one. Genuine Stein!
Michael Scheiner, Jazzzeitung
Exciting music whose direct impact never fades away
In the transparent polyphonic quartet roster of tenor sax, flute, euphonium and drums, Norbert Stein, Michael Heupel, Nicolao Valiensi and Christoph Haberer develop a creative interplay of intuition and rhythmical fervor that shifts between awakening amusement and amazement, and even contemplativeness, in its listeners.
Wolfgang M. Seemann, Passauer Neue Presse
With great humour and detail
Norbert Stein´s "Silent Sitting Bulls" is extraordinarily fun. The tenor saxophonist and Michael Heupel (Flute), Nicolao Valiensi (euphonium) and Christoph Haberer (drums) explore the frontier of micro-tonal composition and improvisation with great humour and detail, all the while the musicians boisterously transcend borders.
Sven Thielmann, hifi & records
A well-tuned team, the four Patas
The music is in perpetual motion, always leading on into singable melodies, also constantly deferring to the individual musicians to unleash themselves, develop their own ideas that are full of creativity, virtuosity and often great emotion... A brilliant segue between popular melodies, swinging sharply like interrupted rhythms, elements of contemporary music and jazz. A very special way to help listeners of current music on their way.
Hans-Juergen von Osterhausen, Jazzpodium
Finely crafted
A fun line-up to perform a complex, bouncy, inviting and mischievious repertoire … Another finely crafted (and recorded) project from Mr. Stein …
François Couture, Delíre Musical
Intriguing & inviting sonorities
All original compositions by Stein … which hold interest & segues into sections of free improv & back again …
ttintle, WRUV Reviews
Unabridged English reviews
of the CD "Silent Sitting Bulls
"Unabridged reviews in German language
Concerto, Westzeit, Jazzzeitung, stereoplay, Jazzthing, Jazzpodium, Frankfurter Rundschau, Jazzthetik, Bad Alchemy, Neue Passauer Presse, Die digitale Jazz-Zeitung, sonic, Koelner Stadt-Anzeiger, Jazzpages, Jazz´n´More, audio & records, Fono Forum
Further reviews as pdf. download:
- Jazz Quadrat by Leonid Auskern (in Russian)
- Jazz & Tzaz by Phontas Troussas (in Greek)
- Culture jazz by Thierry Giard (in French)
- Jazzrytmit by Jouku Kirstilä (in Finish)
- Jazznytt by Tor Hammerø (in Dansk)
- Audio Review by Luca Buti (in Italian)
- UNI by Zdenek K. Slaby (in Czech)
- Jazz Convention by Dino Plasmati (in Italian)
More about PATA GENERATORS and "Direct Speech"
mail@patamusic.de
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