Jazznytt feature
Longer interview coming up in the new edition of Jazznytt, as well as a beautiful essay on You | me by Sondre Lerche.
Guitarist & composer
Longer interview coming up in the new edition of Jazznytt, as well as a beautiful essay on You | me by Sondre Lerche.
Had a chat with Thomas Olsen at Ballade when we played at Berliner Festspiele a few weeks ago, talking about among other things my new record due for release this Friday November 23 on HUBRO. You can read the interview (in Norwegian) here.
I have a new album coming out November 23. featuring Canadian string quartet Quatuor Bozzini, poet Caroline Bergvall and percussionist Ingar Zach. For pre-order and more info, check Hubro's website.
"The guitarist, composer and performer Kim Myhr, whose previous Hubro release, ‘You | me’, received the accolade of a shortlist nomination for the prestigious Nordic Music Prize, composed the extraordinary music and text piece ‘pressing clouds passing crowds’ as a commission for the 2016 FIMAV-festival (Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville) in Quebec, Canada. It features Myhr on 12-string acoustic guitar alongside an expanded version of the celebrated Montreal-based string quartet Quatour Bozzini with percussionist Ingar Zach (Huntsville, Dans les Arbres) and the voice of the poet Caroline Bergvall, reading her own text.
Inspired by meeting poet Caroline Bergvall in 2015 and the music of Robert Ashley that I was listening to at the time, I was wanting to make a longer, slow-moving piece centered around a speaking voice”, says Myhr. “The composition is in six parts, but the parts all blend into each other so that they feel like one slowly changing state of mind.” The result is a triumphant achievement where music and text appear inextricably bound up with each other, with Bergvall’s hypnotic voice and incantatory delivery acting at times like an additional musical instrument, while the string quartet’s stabs, drones and glissando slides provide emphatic punctuation and rich musical counterpoint to the evolving story, which is itself a complex layering of sound and sense, discourse and narrative."
Just came back from Berlin where we had a great time performing You | me at Berliner Festspiele. Really nice to share the stage with Mary Halvorson and Bill Frisell! A radio recording of all three concerts can be heard through Kulturradio.de. Some nice reviews of the concert as well. Photo: Camille Blake
"Myhr is een geluidskunstenaar die met simpele middelen iets heel bijzonder teweeg kan brengen. Steeds met heel kleine veranderingen weer een extra verdieping in de composities kan aanbrengen. You/Me is een project waar repetitie je, hoewel de muzikale lading verstild is, naar haast tranceachtige sferen brengt, Zeer bijzonder begin van de avond." - Written in Music
"Interessanterweise machen die Stücke seines Albums You | Me in ihrer etwas ausgebauten Live-Variante (erweitert auf ganze vier Gitarristen!) erst einmal den Eindruck streng durchgeplanter und unflexibler Minimal Music. Wer das Album kennt, weiß, dass es sich hier um zwei epische Kompositionen für Gitarre und mehrere Perkussionisten (Hans Hulbækmo, Ingar Zach und Tony Buck) handelt, die in der Tradition von Steve Reichs „klassischem“ Material stehen, gefiltert durch leise Anklänge an norwegische Volksmusik und die aus dem Osloer Sofa-Music-Umfeld (oder ähnlich auch von den Necks, apropos Tony Buck) bekannte Ambient-Improvisation, wo Kim Myhr und Ingar Zach mit dem Sofa-Label und ihren zahlreichen Bands und Projekten seit mindestens 15 Jahren wesentliche Protagonisten sind. Der Ansatz, den diese Musiker verfolgen, ist oftmals der eines hypnotischen Musizierens mit sich ineinander verzahnenden und auseinander herauskristallisierenden Entwicklungslinien, was auch beim Zuhörer gerne einen latenten Trance-Zustand evoziert. Das gelang auch beim Auftritt am Sonntag Abend sehr schön und vor allem ohne, dass es je steif und formal geworden wäre, nicht zuletzt weil sich die sieben Musiker offenkundig seit vielen Jahren kennen und gut verstehen." - Manafonistas.de
Norwegian guitarist and composer Kim Myhr has been touring internationally since the early 2000s and has released several records under his own name. His album You | me (2017) was nominated to Nordic Music Prize, and received wide acclaim internationally. As a composer he has made music for Australian Art Orchestra, Canadian string quartet Quatuor Bozzini, Kitchen Orchestra and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra of Norway, and has collaborated with Jenny Hval (on the 2012 collaborative album “In The End His Voice Will Be The Sound Of Paper”, Tony Buck of The Necks (on the album “You | me”), Lasse Marhaug, Christian Wallumrød, poet Caroline Bergvall and many others. He has toured extensively the last fifteen years across Europe, Americas, Asia, and Australia. His last record Vesper with Australian Art Orchestra was nominated for a Norwegian Grammy in 2020 in the contemporary category.
“Kim Myhr is a master of slow-morphing rhythms and sun-dappled textures that seem to glow from the inside”.
- The Guardian
"shimmering like leaves in a breeze when the sun is at its zenith".
★★★★ Sydney Morning Herald
"Kim Myhrs musikk er vakker, poetisk og vrang. (..) Gitaropplevelser helt utenom det vanlige"
5/6 Aftenposten
«sumptuous, sprawling (..) a mesmerizing sonic confab somewhere between the desert and outer space»
WIRE Magazine (UK)
«a deeply personal yet expansive musical universe. [..] Overflowing with waves of interleaving guitars, primal beats, shafts of radiant organ and blissed-out synths the mesmeric ebb and flow has the psych rock detector's needle swerving deep into the red».
PROG magazine, Sid Smith (UK)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Hi-Fi Choice Mag (UK)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Il Manifesto (IT)
"Sympathetic Magic ist ein tiefenverfeinertes Ambient/Electronica-Album, das sich von der Masse der Elektronikproduktionen deutlich abhebt. Über das höchst souveräne Zusammenspiel, die Fusion-Instrumentierung, den semi-akustischen Sound und nicht zuletzt über die durchaus mächtige Besetzung mit bis zu acht Mitwirkenden, drei E-Gitarren und zwei Schlagwerkern (wohlgemerkt pro Track), die aber nie in die Vollen gehen, sondern sehr behutsam und elegant mit dem jeweiligen instrumentellen Raum umgehen, der ihnen gegeben ist".
Groove Magazin (DE)
“A wonderfully sprawling piece of art”
Andrew Jervis, Bandcamp Weekly featured album (US)
«De syv stykkene er fri for effektmakeri og etterlater et inntrykk av at de vil oss vel. Som sanger som henvender seg med klokskap og positivitet. [..] Sympathetic Magic treffer både hjerte og hjerne».
Aftenposten 6/6 (årets sjuende beste norske plate 2022)
«det starter veldig, veldig vakkert, «Sympathetic Magic». Som om noen svømmer med rolige tak i et stille vann. [..] Resultatet er et verk som rommer svært mye, både på mikro- og makro-nivå. Det består av sammenføyde miniatyrfigurer, rytmiske folder og forsiktig utpenslede musikalske temaer. Men også av lydlandskap av symfoniske proporsjoner, som til sammen utgjør mer enn 70 minutter musikk - og til sist munner ut i den sterk prog-inspirerte, mesterlige «Heart Streams».
Klassekampen 5.5/6 (Månedens beste - Klassekampen august 2022)
“Sympathetic Magic is an immersive 74-minute suite of maximalistic minimalism”
- JAZZIZ (US)
"'Up To The Sun Shall Go Your Heartache' is an excellent, long-player of free and expressive jazz and post-rock that moves from the ecstatic to contemplative and sublime."
-Tome To The Weather Machine (US)
"Sympathetic Magic de Kim Myhr vise sans aucun doute les hautes sphères. Ça roule, ça flotte, ça brille. Myhr prend sa musique par le soin des soins et part en visitation. Majestueux, ce disque l’est. Indubitablement."
Point Break (Fr)
«A sonically adventurous record, beautifully listenable and immersive»
Nordic Music Prize Honorary Mention
«Kim Myhr is a master of slow-morphing rhythms and sun-dappled textures that seem to glow from the inside…It’s an album to bolster the spirits and ground the nerves. traveling music for big-sky vistas»
★★★★ The Guardian (UK)
"a tremendous piece of music»
BBC3
«delicate and suffused with beauty, yet exudes a power derived from the clarity of its creative vision. Truly, an ocean of sound.»
★★★★ MOJO (UK)
«surely a minor masterpiece»
Jazzwise
«a trance state between the acoustic and the electronic, where an alchemical late-hours lyricism is born.»
★★★★ MOJO (UK)
Årets sjuende beste norske plate
Dagbladet (NO)
"extravagants orages qui peuvent se transformer en transports shamaniques, dérives cosmiques et ruminations bruitistes, tout un capharnaüm extra-musical parfois effacé au profit de nappes cristallines semblables à d’évanescents mandalas sans cesse recommencés. […] comme des étonnements d’enfance.» Les Inrockuptibles (FR)
«A grotesquely beautiful paradox of sound»
SLUG magazine (US)
«arresting piece of work»
The Quietus (UK)
«Remarkable»
Jazzwise (UK)
«Compelling, riveting listening»
All about Jazz (UK)
«A delirious love letter to the 12-string acoustic guitar»
WIRE Magazine, Clive Bell (UK)
"One of Myhr's finest attributes is his courage to let the music unfold with guileless simplicity, so we focus tightly on the sound. Elsewhere he brings his devilish command of the guitar to bear."
Sydney Morning Herald, John Shand (AU)
«Simple, direct and utterly absorbing»
Fluid Radio (UK)
"An extremely attractive offering: open, considered and refreshingly heedless og trends".
Just Outside (US)
For high-res press photos, interview requests and other press enquiries, please contact Frøydis Bergheim Ruud at Grappa: froydis@grappa.no
Booking and other things: info@kimmyhr.com