Anklam

The first solo album of Swiss double bass player and composer Fridolin Blumer is an exceptional album, even for the rarity-driven catalogue of Carpe Diem Records. Acting as a stylistic counterpoint to the many Early Music solo albums on the label, “Anklam” is a solo album of entirely improvised contemporary double bass music, focusing on instantaneous musical creation in the moment, instead of reviving century-old compositions. Fridolin Blumer is a jazz musician who has dedicated his whole musical career to exploring music beyond the written score, even beyond formal musical concepts. His style is not easily determined by conventional understanding of music. His music is primarily sound that evolves and moves in time, creating structures while moving through and past them, taking the listener on an unforeseeable trip into the feeling and thinking process of the creative mind.

His music is non-descriptive, not trying to depict anything outside of itself, not telling a story other than its own. The album is called Anklam simply because that’s where it was recorded. It is split into twelve pieces just to give it a conceivable structure. The parts have numbers, as they together form a sort of larger musical structure. Any intrinsic meaning, inner beauty or musical logic remains at the listener’s disposal to be discovered, heard or felt. Fridolin Blumer opens a vast space of possibilities of understanding and insight by staying as grounded and elementary as possible. In this way, he creates a sonic artwork that is at the same time spiritual and deeply human.

“The line I trace with my feet walking to the museum is more important and more beautiful than the lines I find there hung up on the walls.”
(F. Hundertwasser)