JAZZ AT CAFÉ MAA N°2
Thursday 3 April 2025 at 8pm
After an exciting first meeting in Helsinki in October 2023, saxophonist Mikko Innanen and pianist Benoît Delbecq meet again on the stage of Jazz at Café Maa on 3 April, 2025. Far from clichés and conventional playing styles, the two accomplished artists have developed a personal language that places them beyond categorizations. As an introduction to this concert, they draw their respective portraits and discuss the philosophy of jazz. Their converging views, filled with kindness and respect, suggest a reunion of great intensity.
“Mikko Innanen is, in my eyes and ears, one of the essential musicians of the European scene. I heard him for the first time in concert when he was playing with the trio PLOP, in Helsinki, and I was playing there with my own trio, in 2012. What amazed me at first, when listening to him, was his deep culture of the history of jazz, and the way he seized it, beyond the idea of mainstream cloning of course, to build a personal style that is open, lively and serene at the same time, a layered way of thinking, the opposite of copycats and followers. A musician loyal to the stories of jazz and folklore, and driven towards lively creation – is very rare.
I have since followed his work, his fruitful connection with the “Scandinavians of Berlin” (Petter Eldh, Otis Sandsjö…) and many others, and it was a pleasure to play for the first time in duo with him in Helsinki in October 2023, while I was on the Vapaat äänet tour with Eyeballing, Sarah Murcia’s quartet. We played compositions by both of us, and I had great pleasure in delving into his concepts of composition and improvisation, which share some similarities with mine: an affection for the rules of the game, a fondness for melody and timbre, as well as a happy insularity. I look forward to meeting him again in Paris this spring!”
– Benoît Delbecq
“Benoît Delbecq is a musician of exceptional nature. With great versatility and a wide range of skills, he is an unpredictable artist yet one with a distinct sound. In the words of Duke Ellington, he places himself “beyond category”. And like Ellington, Delbecq radiates a primal yet refined energy and confidence that everything is perhaps just fine right now.
The deepest essence of jazz has been debated throughout its hundred-year history. What is jazz and what should it be? Of course, there is no single right answer and perhaps this elusiveness is the secret of jazz music’s vitality and diversity.
In my opinion, jazz is more of a philosophy than a musical genre. The absence of hierarchy, the idea that, when playing, all musicians are equal and can influence what direction the music takes, is a central principle of jazz. It is about accepting that things can go a different way than planned beforehand, and that it is even desirable. Putting this philosophy into practice requires musicians to have the ability to listen to their musical partners and to have in trust in their solutions, a mastery of the set and the ability to abandon this control.
Benoît truly understands all these essential elements of jazz. Without having to emphasise his own brilliance, he always manages to fit into the whole and create an atmosphere of serenity, benevolence and tolerance around him.”
– Mikko Innanen
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Artistic direction by Charles Gil, Helsinki-based tour producer and founder of Vapaat äänet agency.