Claudio Puntin (Switzerland) – clarinet, bass clarinet

Chris Dahlgren (USA) – double bass, viola da gamba

Nadia Trohin (Romania/Moldavia) – vocals

Mircea Tiberian (Romania) – piano

 

On September 7th, at Bucharest Jazz Festival, we will play in a group I could call «Aninenin», or just as well «Ineninan», if I don’t put myself first. To be specific: many ensembles take their name after their initials or first letters in the musicians’ names. I thought about trying the ones at the end, and so the above-mentioned combinations arose. Had it not hinted so strongly to INSANE, maybe it’s worth pushing with one of these names. Joke aside, this concert will feature Claudio PuntIN on clarinets, Chris DahlgrEN on double bass, Nadia TrohIN on vocals, and the undersigned TiberIAN on piano. The music will include, for the most part, compositions by the group members, but also some songs from vintage Romanian folklore. As we aim to take on, one by one or, simultaneously, the lead role, improvisors or spontaneous arrangers, we are not considering an attempt to recompose the details in the spirit of a «cover», but a stylistically open recreation of the proposed themes, a reimagination of them in the universal language of jazz. Our endeavors will be placed somewhere between instant composing, imaginary folklore, and jazz. These are territories where all four of us have a certain expertise and we will probably go there as we have done on other occasions. But why «Now as Then» or «Acum ca şi atunci»? Because music, if it wants to be true, has no now, no then, no here, no there. It must be everywhere now as then.” Mircea Tiberian

 

Mircea Tiberian (Romania) – piano

Is one of the artists who have enjoyed a complex and spectacular evolution in the Romanian music of the last decades. His musical activity has concreted in thousands of concerts and more than twenty albums under his own name. Among the most recently released ones we mention “Both Sides of a River” (Tiberian, Dahlgren, Betsch), “Rosa das Rosas” with Maria Răducanu and Lisle Ellis, “Dance around the Dragon Tree” in duet with Maurice de Martin, “Back to My Angel” and “Looking forward to the Past”, solo albums released in 2019, respectively in 2020.

Mircea Tiberian plays, at the same time, an essential role in teaching jazz and improvised music, being the initiator of the first and most important jazz and pop music department in Romania. As PhD, he has been leading since its founding (1990) the jazz section of the National Music University in Bucharest, where most of the Romanian jazz musicians of the last decades have been initiated. Mircea Tiberian has been awarded five times the prize for “Jazz Composition” by the Union of Composers and Musicologists in Romania, the latest one in 2012, for the anthology album “Jazz inside out”.

 

Claudio Puntin (Switzerland) – clarinet, bass clarinet

As a young man, Puntin played traditional popular music with his brother and father, or the harmonica in the rural festivals in Friuli, Italia. He began playing the clarinet when he was 9. From 1987 to 1993 he studied clarinet, bass clarinet and contemporary music in Köln and Rotterdam. He was a regular participant in Sergiu Celibidache’s classes and describes him as one of his most important teachers.

He collaborates with the Radio Orchestra in Bavaria, Lucerne Jazz Orchestra, WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, WDR Big Band and with artists Skúli Sverrisson, Samuel Rohrer, Nils Wogram, Ricardo Villalobos on a regular basis. As composer and producer, he created music for radio plays, films, theatre, and exhibitions.

He wrote the soundtracks for various films, among which “Sunset in Venice” (Venice Short Film Award) by Spiros Taraviras and worked as a studio musician in such films as: “Beyond Silence” (Oscar nominee). Claudio Puntin received many awards, such as Southern Comforts Jazz Musician of the Year in 1999 – Essen Jazzpott. In 2000, he was awarded Werkjahr of the Zug Canton, and in 2004 he won the first prize awarded by the Westdeutsche Rundfunk din Köln.

 

Chris Dahlgren (USA) – double bass, viola da gamba

In his forming years, the American double bass player Chris Dahlgren crossed all contemporary musical genres starting with rock and then continuing with mainstream jazz in the clubs of Cincinatti, the city of his teen years. There he had the opportunity to play with world jazz personalities such as Herb Ellis, Red Rodney, John von Ohlen, Art Lande, Charles Tolliver or Joe Lovano; the first albums he makes are a tribute to alternative rock with ample openings to modern jazz. Later on, he studies composing at Wesleyan University with contemporary music personalities, such as La Monte Young and Anthony Braxton, making the duo album “ABCD” (2006) with the latter. In his intense activity in New York, Chris Dahlgren participated in numerous projects, orbiting between contemporary jazz and avant-garde. Also, during those years, he recorded the author album “Slow Commotion” with guitarist Ben Monder and drummer Kenny Wollesen as partners. Chris Dahlgren and Mircea Tiberian together with German drummer Maurice de Martin have made in Romania two trio album projects, named “Intelligence Is All Around” and “Raphael” and then “La margine de Bucureşti” (On the edge of Bucharest) with the young singer Nadia Trohin. Dahlgren features with Tiberian and American drummer John Betsch on the albums “Ulysses” and then “Both Sides of the River” in the improvised musical project Tiberian/Dahlgren/Betsch – a group that was active for more than 15 years.

 

Nadia Trohin (Romania/Moldavia) – vocals

Is an artist who, ever since her debut in the field, has conquered a special place among the notable Romanian jazz singers. Her musical portfolio contains numerous appearances on tv shows and radio, as well as at festivals, in partnerships with representative Romanian musicians – Nicolas Simion, Cristian Soleanu, Cătălin Milea or in international formulas with Chris Dahlgren, John Betsch, Christian Lillinger, Jerzy Małek, Jeszenszky György and many more.

In 2011 she began the collaboration with Mircea Tiberian, with whom she has had dozens of appearances with musical projects aimed at the jazz adaptation for music pieces in the recent or interbelic Romanian pop music field, as well as authentic folklore. The two have realized together two studio albums: „La margine de București” / “On the edge of Bucharest” (2012) and „Aleea cosmonauţilor”/ “Astronauts’ Alley” (2020).

Nadia Trohin is also active in the field of musical education, as a jazz canto teacher at the National Music University in Bucharest.