Although Danish violinist Bjarke Falgren‘s has collaborated with a number of groups and his easy tones have graced plenty of other people’s work, there is very little released under his own name, so this latest album Turkis must contain pieces very close to his heart.
The washed-out, sun-bleached image on the cover and the faraway look in his eyes conveys a lot of the aesthetic of the songs here which, ably assisted by Heine Hansen on piano, Anders Holm Jensen on drums, Morten Lundsby on bass, Jakob Riis Holm on guitar, Eliel Williams Lazo Linares on percussion and Aksel Falgren on keys, look into the distance, lifted by the desire to go beyond, blurring distance, time and style into one fluid whole.
Across the ten tracks on the album, Bjarke himself switches between violin, viola and cello depending on what the song in question needs; while Heine switches between piano, Wurlitzer and Rhodes so that moods and textures are in constant flux. What with the addition of congas and tabla to an already shapeshifting rhythm section, there is little opportunity for the listener to disengage. Through it all though, there is a smoothness, an ease of playing and conjoining which is irresistible. The baton is passed from strings to piano to guitar effortlessly and, as the songs subtly change shape, so the mood changes too.Opener “Embrace” sets things out; the percussive shuffle, the throb of bass and the gentle jostle of piano frame the violin as it drifts on the breeze. There is a sweet yet toothsome groove that carries a sense of constant motion and although the moods alter, there is nearly always a swing that will have the feet tapping or the head nodding, be it the sultry Latin sway of “Il Posto Del Padre”, with its tremolo guitar and aching sense of loss, or the swift handclap and laughing bass-infused “Cigarillos Por Favor”, where the joyful piano inhabits a world of swooning sexiness, full of life and desire aided further by the dash of the congas.
It is very much a journey through emotions and where Bjarke switches between instruments, so this is exacerbated, plus the songs follow no discernible pattern; it seems very much that the group chooses the direction on the fly, possibly taking Bjarke’s lead but always offering their own impression of what is required. Clearly the cello tends to lend a more melancholic note but, the as on “Tiden Står Stille Her”, the swing can’t help but lift it out of the doldrums. The violin is strummed for part of “Rossignol”, which is a madcap dash with which the deep piano can barely keep up; while “Rosa’s Forår” has a nostalgic pop feel, a yearning that becomes more expansive as the song reaches higher.
Overall, Turkis is an album of passion and desire refracted through a prism of distance and yearning for something just out of reach. I can see why Bjarke waited for this set of songs to put his name to and it is a delight from start to finish.
-Mr Olivetti-
