TRYGVE SEIM - Singing Songs Of Rumi
Norwegian saxophonist, Trygve Seim, is now becoming a ubiquitous presence on the European scene and garnering favourable comparrisons with fellow countryman, Jan Garbarek. Like Garbarek, Seim plays tenor and soprano saxophone with an instantly identifiable sound on each, but that is perhaps where the similarities end. Whereas the older man carved out a career, predominantly as leader (especially since the end of the seventies), Trygve is happy to have a far more promiscuous career and can frequently be heard in other people's bands and recordings, saying that "Playing in different projects gives me free musical development. I learn new things and also get to know new people. But, of course, it is a criterion that I like the music and that I feel that I can contribute in some way."
This modest approach to his work provides plenty of opportunity to follow his career, having appeared on more than 20 albums on ECM many of which have been for other people, or collaborative projects and this also perhaps has had a slightly negative impact as if there is a reluctance to push himself forward as leader. Making a big splash with his debut album Different Rivers in 2001 which was followed up by the incredible Sangam for large ensemble a few years later, it seems to have taken quite some time before this new album under Trygve's own name was to appear. "For various reasons I got some kind of writer’s block in the summer of 2006, "explains the saxophonist. "Two years later, summer 2008, my first child was born, followed by my second in 2010, and the period with small children wasn’t really the best time for large composing works or for pushing my own career. It was fantastic to spend lots of time with my children though! Of course I continued to play concerts and record music, but mostly with my duo’s with Frode Haltli and Andreas Utnem, and with other artists projects, like Manu Katché, Sinikka Langeland, Iro Haarla, Jacob Young a.o., plus between 2005 and 2010 I also spent a great deal of time in Cairo studying arabic music and also playing concerts with Fathy Salama and his group Sharkiat."
This modest approach to his work provides plenty of opportunity to follow his career, having appeared on more than 20 albums on ECM many of which have been for other people, or collaborative projects and this also perhaps has had a slightly negative impact as if there is a reluctance to push himself forward as leader. Making a big splash with his debut album Different Rivers in 2001 which was followed up by the incredible Sangam for large ensemble a few years later, it seems to have taken quite some time before this new album under Trygve's own name was to appear. "For various reasons I got some kind of writer’s block in the summer of 2006, "explains the saxophonist. "Two years later, summer 2008, my first child was born, followed by my second in 2010, and the period with small children wasn’t really the best time for large composing works or for pushing my own career. It was fantastic to spend lots of time with my children though! Of course I continued to play concerts and record music, but mostly with my duo’s with Frode Haltli and Andreas Utnem, and with other artists projects, like Manu Katché, Sinikka Langeland, Iro Haarla, Jacob Young a.o., plus between 2005 and 2010 I also spent a great deal of time in Cairo studying arabic music and also playing concerts with Fathy Salama and his group Sharkiat."
Thankfully the writer's block seemed to subside and in August 2016 there was a new album to hit the shops, the eagerly awaited Rumi Songs, featuring Seim's saxophones alongside mezzo-soprano Tora Augustad's voice and the cello and accordian of Trygve's longstanding musical associates, Svante Henryson and Frode Haltli in an engaging and musically intriguing set that draws inspiration from the poetry of the thirteenth century Persian philosopher and scholar, Jelauddin Rumi (1207 - 1273). However, never one to rush the original seeds for the album were planted some time ago, as Trygve explains, "In 2003 the opera singer Anne-Lise Berntsen commissioned music from me, for herself, church organ and piano, for a church concert she was giving, where she performed music by Mahler, Gorecki, Gubaidulina – and me. I was very grateful and honoured to be put in these three composers’ company and also to be asked by Berntsen to compose for her, one of the most famous opera singers in Norway at that time (she unfortunately passed away in 2012).
Berntsen was a very open-minded person and she was always curious about new things and other cultures. At that time she was reading about the Sufis in general and was specially fascinated with Rumi’s poetry. For the commission I was free to choose whatever text material I wanted to use (or not to use), but Berntsen gave me two books of Coleman Barks’ English translations of Jelaluddin Rumi, ‘The Essential Rumi’ and ‘Like This’, told me she preferred Barks’ versions to others she had read, and said she would be very happy if I could use text material from these books in my compositions. And so I did, and my two first Rumi Songs were composed. A couple of years later I wrote another song for Anne-Lise and also a Rumi-piece for Trio Mediaeval, Frode Haltli and me."
Continuing, Seim says "I really liked all the Rumi poems I read, and composing my very first Rumi-song was a special experience for me: I opened the book on a random page and I started to sing the poem without having read it before, as if the melody was supposed to be like that – that it was already composed. Normally I read a poem many times and I try to analyse and understand the poem as much as possible before I go on finding the music in it, but when I wrote my first Rumi Song I sang the poem as soon as I read it. I saw this experience almost as a sign to explore more about Rumi and the Sufis. Unfortunately it was only that first time that the music came that easily …
Tora Augestad also adapted my Rumi Songs to her repertoire, already in 2004, and she always encouraged me to write more songs. During a visit to Tora whom had moved to Berlin, I heard Karol Szymanowski’s beautiful song cycle ‘Des Hafis Liebeslieder’ (Love Songs of Hafiz) in the Berlin Philharmonie, and since I had already written 3-4 songs on Rumi’s poetry that concert gave me the idea of making a full song cycle with these poems by Jelaluddin Rumi. My songs are in a totally different musical language to Szymanowski’s songs, but still I often think of that concert when working with my Rumi Songs. Another inspiring experince for me was in December 2007 when I went to Konya (the city where Rumi lived most of his life and also died) to see and hear the celebrations for Rumi’s 800th anniversary. I heard a lot of fantastic Sufi music, and it was also amazing to see all the dervish dancers perform the whirling trance dance. Some years later, I guess tired of waiting, Tora got economical support from The Norwegian Art Council so she could commission the full cycle from me, gave me a deadline and I simply had to sit down and compose again. I’m incredibly grateful for that!"
By the time of his death on the 17th December, 1273 Rumi's output had stretched to forty thousand verses, so just how do you go about selecting the poems to set to music? "I have tried to focus on Coleman Barks’ versions, says Trygve. "This is partly because Barks and I spoke about doing performances together, him reading between or in the songs, but most of all because his versions always had a special impact on me. I like his project of making this almost thousand-year-old poetry which is written in very strict form, into modern American free verse. The mixture of these two worlds creates something new. I have heard and seen many interviews with Barks and I also met him once. He is a fascinating man, full of wisdom, good ideas, humour, seriousness and kindness. Barks and I even performed once and that was a fabulous experience – he has such great timing and also time (beat) in his reading and a strong presence within the music, like he is a musician and his poetry his instrument. I have all the Rumi books Barks has published, and of course many Rumi books by other translators too (Nicholson, Arberry, Lewis etc). On the song ‘Seeing Double’ it wasn’t possible for me not to use the beautiful version by Kabir and Camille Helminski.
I often look for the ‘music’ within the poem. And when I find a poem I believe I can set to music, I write it down on nice paper with a good pen (in my own handwriting). I believe that the poem (or whatever you write down, letters, music etc) enters your brain in a manner that is more easily processed and assimilated by writing it down with pen and paper. Then I search for the music. Sometimes it comes, sometimes it doesn’t."
Different Rivers and Sangam are remarkable albums that place an emphasis on acoustic instruments and their relationship with the players, with naturally produced sounds and tones that blend to produce a unique musical soundscape. Rumi Songs continues that process with a smaller instrumentation, si Iask Trygve if that was that a conscious decision?
"Yes, indeed. I have become more and more an acoustic player and also acoustic composer/arranger, and I prefer doing acoustic concerts without PA-systems. We did that a lot with my large ensemble during the last 3-4 years we were performing, and when I play duo with Frode Haltli or Andreas Utnem we most of the time play acoustically. It was a kind of backward journey for me because I came from jazz music where everything is amplified so I didn’t need to bother about the natural laws of each instrument because I could always rely on the sound engineer to get what I wanted in focus. Once we started to play acoustically with my large ensemble I had to start to rearrange the music and use the instruments the way they were meant to be heard."
Berntsen was a very open-minded person and she was always curious about new things and other cultures. At that time she was reading about the Sufis in general and was specially fascinated with Rumi’s poetry. For the commission I was free to choose whatever text material I wanted to use (or not to use), but Berntsen gave me two books of Coleman Barks’ English translations of Jelaluddin Rumi, ‘The Essential Rumi’ and ‘Like This’, told me she preferred Barks’ versions to others she had read, and said she would be very happy if I could use text material from these books in my compositions. And so I did, and my two first Rumi Songs were composed. A couple of years later I wrote another song for Anne-Lise and also a Rumi-piece for Trio Mediaeval, Frode Haltli and me."
Continuing, Seim says "I really liked all the Rumi poems I read, and composing my very first Rumi-song was a special experience for me: I opened the book on a random page and I started to sing the poem without having read it before, as if the melody was supposed to be like that – that it was already composed. Normally I read a poem many times and I try to analyse and understand the poem as much as possible before I go on finding the music in it, but when I wrote my first Rumi Song I sang the poem as soon as I read it. I saw this experience almost as a sign to explore more about Rumi and the Sufis. Unfortunately it was only that first time that the music came that easily …
Tora Augestad also adapted my Rumi Songs to her repertoire, already in 2004, and she always encouraged me to write more songs. During a visit to Tora whom had moved to Berlin, I heard Karol Szymanowski’s beautiful song cycle ‘Des Hafis Liebeslieder’ (Love Songs of Hafiz) in the Berlin Philharmonie, and since I had already written 3-4 songs on Rumi’s poetry that concert gave me the idea of making a full song cycle with these poems by Jelaluddin Rumi. My songs are in a totally different musical language to Szymanowski’s songs, but still I often think of that concert when working with my Rumi Songs. Another inspiring experince for me was in December 2007 when I went to Konya (the city where Rumi lived most of his life and also died) to see and hear the celebrations for Rumi’s 800th anniversary. I heard a lot of fantastic Sufi music, and it was also amazing to see all the dervish dancers perform the whirling trance dance. Some years later, I guess tired of waiting, Tora got economical support from The Norwegian Art Council so she could commission the full cycle from me, gave me a deadline and I simply had to sit down and compose again. I’m incredibly grateful for that!"
By the time of his death on the 17th December, 1273 Rumi's output had stretched to forty thousand verses, so just how do you go about selecting the poems to set to music? "I have tried to focus on Coleman Barks’ versions, says Trygve. "This is partly because Barks and I spoke about doing performances together, him reading between or in the songs, but most of all because his versions always had a special impact on me. I like his project of making this almost thousand-year-old poetry which is written in very strict form, into modern American free verse. The mixture of these two worlds creates something new. I have heard and seen many interviews with Barks and I also met him once. He is a fascinating man, full of wisdom, good ideas, humour, seriousness and kindness. Barks and I even performed once and that was a fabulous experience – he has such great timing and also time (beat) in his reading and a strong presence within the music, like he is a musician and his poetry his instrument. I have all the Rumi books Barks has published, and of course many Rumi books by other translators too (Nicholson, Arberry, Lewis etc). On the song ‘Seeing Double’ it wasn’t possible for me not to use the beautiful version by Kabir and Camille Helminski.
I often look for the ‘music’ within the poem. And when I find a poem I believe I can set to music, I write it down on nice paper with a good pen (in my own handwriting). I believe that the poem (or whatever you write down, letters, music etc) enters your brain in a manner that is more easily processed and assimilated by writing it down with pen and paper. Then I search for the music. Sometimes it comes, sometimes it doesn’t."
Different Rivers and Sangam are remarkable albums that place an emphasis on acoustic instruments and their relationship with the players, with naturally produced sounds and tones that blend to produce a unique musical soundscape. Rumi Songs continues that process with a smaller instrumentation, si Iask Trygve if that was that a conscious decision?
"Yes, indeed. I have become more and more an acoustic player and also acoustic composer/arranger, and I prefer doing acoustic concerts without PA-systems. We did that a lot with my large ensemble during the last 3-4 years we were performing, and when I play duo with Frode Haltli or Andreas Utnem we most of the time play acoustically. It was a kind of backward journey for me because I came from jazz music where everything is amplified so I didn’t need to bother about the natural laws of each instrument because I could always rely on the sound engineer to get what I wanted in focus. Once we started to play acoustically with my large ensemble I had to start to rearrange the music and use the instruments the way they were meant to be heard."
Continuing his train of thought, Trygve continues "When I began to write the full cycle of Rumi Songs (in 2013), I had already asked Frode and Svante to be part of the project. Frode had since 2001 been a member of my large ensemble, the 10-piece band with whom I perform the ‘Sangam’ and ‘Different Rivers’ repertoire, and Svante Henryson since 2009. You know, both accordion and saxophone where built to replace other instruments - the accordion partly to function as a portable church organ, but also to replace the orchestra (being a little portable orchestra), and the saxophone was actually built to replace the clarinets in the military brass bands - a general in the French army asked Adolphe Sax to make an instrument sounding like a clarinet but with a much stronger volume, so that the army bands wouldn’t need that many clarinet players. In one way Frode and I represent the seven wind instruments of my large ensemble (plus the accordion of course) and Svante who is the only string player in my large ensemble is still the only string player in Rumi Songs. So, in a way, Rumi Songs is my large ensemble without drums plus Tora.
"I did of course consider composing all the music for Tora and my large ensemble, but I ended up doing it for this smaller combo partly because that gives more flexibility in the performing process. I find it very thrilling to compose music for musicians like Tora, Frode and Svante, because they are so extremely flexible musicians. On the one hand, they come from the classical music tradition and they are outstanding classical musicians performing as soloists with symphony orchestras and also as ensemble musicians in classical ensembles and in new music. On the other hand , they are great jazz musicians and improvisers. They are able to blend with others within an ensemble but they can still stand out with their own personal sound as soloists when the musical spotlight is on them. Tora’s voice I immediately fell in love with the first time I heard her sing already in 2003. She has some colours in her voice that I like a lot but though I cannot really explain why, her voice speaks directly to my heart. She performs the most complex modern new music (for example with Ensemble Modern, Klangforum Wien etc) and sings it in such a way it sounds as if it’s easy to perform, but she is also capable of bringing in the personal voice which is needed to do more simple songs like, for example, ‘In Your Beauty’. "
Last summer was a busy time for the saxophonist as Rumi Songs was just one of four albums that ECM released within a few weeks of each other on which he was featured, so i asked Trygve about his involvement with these very different albums, starting with Sinikka Langeland and her album The Magical Forest, which incidentally also features vocals. "I started to play with Sinikka in 2003 after Manfred Eicher suggested to her to have me in her band. At that time I had recently started to study Arabic music a bit and found that a lot of the elements from that music (for example, maqams with quarter tones) are similar to Norwegian folk music which is Sinikka’s musical base. Sinikka is a strong song writer, and she has a very personal and beautiful voice. Also the kantele is such a beautiful instrument. Ever since I met Edward Vesala in Finland in 1994, and became a big fan of his music, I have always felt a special connection with the Finnish people and culture, and since Sinikka is half Finnish and lives in an area in Norway called Finnskogen (the Finnish Forest) I guess that connects us too. I have been so lucky to play on four of her albums and it has been interesting to hear her in so many different ways and also to experience her development over the past ten years."
"I did of course consider composing all the music for Tora and my large ensemble, but I ended up doing it for this smaller combo partly because that gives more flexibility in the performing process. I find it very thrilling to compose music for musicians like Tora, Frode and Svante, because they are so extremely flexible musicians. On the one hand, they come from the classical music tradition and they are outstanding classical musicians performing as soloists with symphony orchestras and also as ensemble musicians in classical ensembles and in new music. On the other hand , they are great jazz musicians and improvisers. They are able to blend with others within an ensemble but they can still stand out with their own personal sound as soloists when the musical spotlight is on them. Tora’s voice I immediately fell in love with the first time I heard her sing already in 2003. She has some colours in her voice that I like a lot but though I cannot really explain why, her voice speaks directly to my heart. She performs the most complex modern new music (for example with Ensemble Modern, Klangforum Wien etc) and sings it in such a way it sounds as if it’s easy to perform, but she is also capable of bringing in the personal voice which is needed to do more simple songs like, for example, ‘In Your Beauty’. "
Last summer was a busy time for the saxophonist as Rumi Songs was just one of four albums that ECM released within a few weeks of each other on which he was featured, so i asked Trygve about his involvement with these very different albums, starting with Sinikka Langeland and her album The Magical Forest, which incidentally also features vocals. "I started to play with Sinikka in 2003 after Manfred Eicher suggested to her to have me in her band. At that time I had recently started to study Arabic music a bit and found that a lot of the elements from that music (for example, maqams with quarter tones) are similar to Norwegian folk music which is Sinikka’s musical base. Sinikka is a strong song writer, and she has a very personal and beautiful voice. Also the kantele is such a beautiful instrument. Ever since I met Edward Vesala in Finland in 1994, and became a big fan of his music, I have always felt a special connection with the Finnish people and culture, and since Sinikka is half Finnish and lives in an area in Norway called Finnskogen (the Finnish Forest) I guess that connects us too. I have been so lucky to play on four of her albums and it has been interesting to hear her in so many different ways and also to experience her development over the past ten years."
The saxophonist has also instilled himself as a key member of the Mats Eilerstsen Ensemble, and Mats' album Rubicon is quite a radical departure from Seim's and Sinikka’s music. "Actually I joined the Rubicon ensemble by accident" laughs Trygve. "Mats composed this large piece as a commission for the Voss Jazz Festival in 2014 and originally Tore Brunborg was supposed to play at the premiere but when he had to cancel for family reasons four days before the premiere, Mats asked me and I was free that week so I could step in. Luckily I was asked to do the recording as well so I guess I’m in the band now … Mats is one of my absolutely favourite bass players, so I’m very fortunate to be able to play with him in so many constellations: with his Rubicon band, in my new ‘Helsinki Songs’ quartet and in The Source. Mats is such a strong composer too, as you can hear on Rubicon and on his other projects like Skydive, etc."
The last of the four releases, Iro Haarla’s Ante Lucem is another very different musical environment, written for Symphony Orchestra and Jazz Quintet. So I ask Trygve about his musical realtionship with Iro which goes back a number of years. "I got to know Iro Haarla in 1994", says the saxophonist. "I had become a big fan of her husband at that time, Edward Vesala, and especially the record Edward Vesala Sound and Fury - Invisible Storm. I also heard their concert at the Molde Jazz Festival in 1992, performing the music from that album. In 1994 we played in Finland with The Source and since all four of us (all in our early twenties) were big fans of Edward’s music, we simply called him, and he and Iro invited us for lunch. Two years later I did a concert together with Edward and Iro, plus Per Oddvar Johansen, Arve Henriksen and Jorma Tapio, and some years even later Edward and I formed a quartet together (Trygve Seim/Edward Vesala Quartet) with Iro on piano and harp and Anders Jormin on bass. Unfortunately, we managed to play only one concert together (Kongsberg Jazz Festival 1999) before Edward so sadly passed away. After that Iro and I decided to continue to play together and after trying a couple of different combinations we ended up with a quintet that later, for natural reasons, became her quintet.
"What people (or me too before I learned about it) do not know is that Iro and Edward wrote all the music together although it was signed by only Edward. Iro was educated, a classical composer from the Sibelius Academy, while Edward couldn’t even read or write notes. When you listen to Edward’s music chronologically you clearly hear the difference in the quality of both the compositions and the orchestration work from the time that Edward married Iro (who was 20 years younger) but also the musical direction from the record ‘Lumi’ onwards. The reason is that Iro helped him with (or in fact did most of) the compositional work. It is a tragedy in many ways that Iro wasn’t acknowledged for her work with Edward, not only because she never got the copyrights she should have had (they divorced just before he died) but also because many people said that when Iro wrote music after Edward’s death, it was a copy of Edward. The fact was Edward never told anyone that Iro played such an important role in composing the work and adding both her skills and her ‘voice/sound’ to it."
With the recent albums that he has been featured on, and indeed throughout his rapidly increasing discography, Seim has shown himself not just to be a resourceful improviser and asset to any musical situation, but also a musician whose interest in the music is not confined or restricted by a preconceived notions of genre, but simply by what is the right situation for him to continue to grow. So how did he begin his musical journey and why the saxophone? " I started to play music very late, at age thirteen. Before that I was a 'normal' football kid, plus I had a passion for ski jumping during the winters. I listened a lot to music though. When I was only seven, I became fan of the music of The Police, The Clash, Sham 69, Bob Marley and artists in the 70s punk/reggae aera – mainly because my elder brother, who was playing electric bass in a punk band, listened a lot to those artists. My stepfather also used to play guitar and sing (Beatles songs also). I was also into poetry very young, and even used to write poems myself. My father, who lived abroad most of my childhood, offered me his saxophone, which he had bought in Mumbai, India, when he worked there, and got the idea that he should start to learn saxophone (which he didn’t have time to…). At first I said no to his offer, but when I found out that the record my stepfather listened a lot to at that time, Jan Garbarek’s Eventyr was music with saxophone, I called my father again and begged for that horn. In the beginning I listened of course a lot to Jan (my favourite record was Photo with …), but Dexter Gordon was also an important influence for me at that time, as well as Norwegian saxophonist Tore Brunborg. After finishing my studies in jazz, I became interested in Oriental music and also Indian raag music, and I sometimes wonder if that came, as a ‘virus’ with my first saxophone which was bought in Mumbai …
"Nowadays I play Conn saxophones" , he elaborates. "The soprano is a New Wonder Series 1 from 1920, the tenor a New Wonder Series 2 from 1926 (often called a Conn Chu Berry). I play these Conn horns because I got to know German saxophonist and repair man George Pfister who lives in Berlin, in the nineties, and we’ve remained friends since then. He played only old Conn horns at that time and he had such a beautiful tone. He suggested he find the same horns for me and so he did - first the soprano, some years later the tenor. He overhauled the horns and I totally fell in love with the sound of both! George is somehow a miracle man when it comes to repairing and maintaining old saxophones so whenever there are serious problems with the instruments (which it quite often on any saxophone) I always go to Berlin and see George. A couple of years ago he had started to make wooden tenor mouthpieces because he couldn’t find any with the inside shape he was looking for himself. I tried several of his mouthpieces and must admit I had a really hard time in the beginning. But he sent 4 or 5 mouthpieces home with me to check out and after a while I really liked one of them – which I still play. The wood gives a totally different sound to ebonite or metal, and it is closer to my idiom of a sound."
As for future projects and recordings for Seim it is hoped that we do not have to wait too long for some more original music from one of Europe's most original contemporary voices. In the meantime, Trygve seems to have his destiny firmly under control, saying that he wishes "to continue … with ‘Rumi Songs’, trying to get my large ensemble on the road again, to continue to play duo with Frode Haltli and Andreas Utnem, and to participate on other artists’ projects. I have also formed a new quartet with the Estonian pianist Kristjan Randalu, bass player Mats Eilertsen and the Finnish drummer Markku Ounaskari. The band name is ‘Trygve Seim - Helsinki Songs’ and we play instrumental compositions I have written, many of them from periods when I have stayed in the Finnish Composers Society’s apartment in Helsinki specifically to compose. We play in the Frankfurt Alte Oper next May and hopefully other places too, in that same period. We have also recorded some material but we are considering going to the studio once more before releasing it."
The last of the four releases, Iro Haarla’s Ante Lucem is another very different musical environment, written for Symphony Orchestra and Jazz Quintet. So I ask Trygve about his musical realtionship with Iro which goes back a number of years. "I got to know Iro Haarla in 1994", says the saxophonist. "I had become a big fan of her husband at that time, Edward Vesala, and especially the record Edward Vesala Sound and Fury - Invisible Storm. I also heard their concert at the Molde Jazz Festival in 1992, performing the music from that album. In 1994 we played in Finland with The Source and since all four of us (all in our early twenties) were big fans of Edward’s music, we simply called him, and he and Iro invited us for lunch. Two years later I did a concert together with Edward and Iro, plus Per Oddvar Johansen, Arve Henriksen and Jorma Tapio, and some years even later Edward and I formed a quartet together (Trygve Seim/Edward Vesala Quartet) with Iro on piano and harp and Anders Jormin on bass. Unfortunately, we managed to play only one concert together (Kongsberg Jazz Festival 1999) before Edward so sadly passed away. After that Iro and I decided to continue to play together and after trying a couple of different combinations we ended up with a quintet that later, for natural reasons, became her quintet.
"What people (or me too before I learned about it) do not know is that Iro and Edward wrote all the music together although it was signed by only Edward. Iro was educated, a classical composer from the Sibelius Academy, while Edward couldn’t even read or write notes. When you listen to Edward’s music chronologically you clearly hear the difference in the quality of both the compositions and the orchestration work from the time that Edward married Iro (who was 20 years younger) but also the musical direction from the record ‘Lumi’ onwards. The reason is that Iro helped him with (or in fact did most of) the compositional work. It is a tragedy in many ways that Iro wasn’t acknowledged for her work with Edward, not only because she never got the copyrights she should have had (they divorced just before he died) but also because many people said that when Iro wrote music after Edward’s death, it was a copy of Edward. The fact was Edward never told anyone that Iro played such an important role in composing the work and adding both her skills and her ‘voice/sound’ to it."
With the recent albums that he has been featured on, and indeed throughout his rapidly increasing discography, Seim has shown himself not just to be a resourceful improviser and asset to any musical situation, but also a musician whose interest in the music is not confined or restricted by a preconceived notions of genre, but simply by what is the right situation for him to continue to grow. So how did he begin his musical journey and why the saxophone? " I started to play music very late, at age thirteen. Before that I was a 'normal' football kid, plus I had a passion for ski jumping during the winters. I listened a lot to music though. When I was only seven, I became fan of the music of The Police, The Clash, Sham 69, Bob Marley and artists in the 70s punk/reggae aera – mainly because my elder brother, who was playing electric bass in a punk band, listened a lot to those artists. My stepfather also used to play guitar and sing (Beatles songs also). I was also into poetry very young, and even used to write poems myself. My father, who lived abroad most of my childhood, offered me his saxophone, which he had bought in Mumbai, India, when he worked there, and got the idea that he should start to learn saxophone (which he didn’t have time to…). At first I said no to his offer, but when I found out that the record my stepfather listened a lot to at that time, Jan Garbarek’s Eventyr was music with saxophone, I called my father again and begged for that horn. In the beginning I listened of course a lot to Jan (my favourite record was Photo with …), but Dexter Gordon was also an important influence for me at that time, as well as Norwegian saxophonist Tore Brunborg. After finishing my studies in jazz, I became interested in Oriental music and also Indian raag music, and I sometimes wonder if that came, as a ‘virus’ with my first saxophone which was bought in Mumbai …
"Nowadays I play Conn saxophones" , he elaborates. "The soprano is a New Wonder Series 1 from 1920, the tenor a New Wonder Series 2 from 1926 (often called a Conn Chu Berry). I play these Conn horns because I got to know German saxophonist and repair man George Pfister who lives in Berlin, in the nineties, and we’ve remained friends since then. He played only old Conn horns at that time and he had such a beautiful tone. He suggested he find the same horns for me and so he did - first the soprano, some years later the tenor. He overhauled the horns and I totally fell in love with the sound of both! George is somehow a miracle man when it comes to repairing and maintaining old saxophones so whenever there are serious problems with the instruments (which it quite often on any saxophone) I always go to Berlin and see George. A couple of years ago he had started to make wooden tenor mouthpieces because he couldn’t find any with the inside shape he was looking for himself. I tried several of his mouthpieces and must admit I had a really hard time in the beginning. But he sent 4 or 5 mouthpieces home with me to check out and after a while I really liked one of them – which I still play. The wood gives a totally different sound to ebonite or metal, and it is closer to my idiom of a sound."
As for future projects and recordings for Seim it is hoped that we do not have to wait too long for some more original music from one of Europe's most original contemporary voices. In the meantime, Trygve seems to have his destiny firmly under control, saying that he wishes "to continue … with ‘Rumi Songs’, trying to get my large ensemble on the road again, to continue to play duo with Frode Haltli and Andreas Utnem, and to participate on other artists’ projects. I have also formed a new quartet with the Estonian pianist Kristjan Randalu, bass player Mats Eilertsen and the Finnish drummer Markku Ounaskari. The band name is ‘Trygve Seim - Helsinki Songs’ and we play instrumental compositions I have written, many of them from periods when I have stayed in the Finnish Composers Society’s apartment in Helsinki specifically to compose. We play in the Frankfurt Alte Oper next May and hopefully other places too, in that same period. We have also recorded some material but we are considering going to the studio once more before releasing it."
For more information visit ECM Records and Trygve's website.
Click on the album covers to read our reviews.
Click on the album covers to read our reviews.
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