Kasey Knudsen: News

"the events in our lives happen in a sequence of time, but in their
significance to ourselves they find their own order...It is the continuous thread of revelation. The longer you look at one object, the more of the
world you see in it."

-Flannery O'Connor

"The concept that music expresses something is generally accepted."

-Arnold Schoenberg

I had a concert this past Saturday that featured the premier of 5 new compositions of mine for "small big band" as well as a beautiful arrangement of "And I love Her" by Adam Jenkins. I had spent so long preparing for the concert that it felt totally surreal while it was actually happening. I was fortunate enough to have many of my favorite players on the concert; George Ban-Weiss, Tim Bulkley, David Michel Ruddy, Eric Vogler, Evan Francis, Rob Ewing and Adam Jenkins. To hear these great players bringing my music to life was dramatic, dynamic, inspiring, exciting, & strangely enough, relaxing. I kept thinking, "well, it couldn't be in better hands." I hope to bring this group together again soon, it was one of the most satisfying of my musical experiences, the kind that make you realize it is all worth while. I should have some sound clips on here soon...

Had a really fun gig last night with Michael Parsons and Chris Bjorkbom. Michael plays B-3 a lot of times on our gigs, playing bass lines, soloing and comping all at the same time. damn. He is able to do all of those things well and still stay really creative with his improvising. Chris is a really creative drummer and is powerful while still expressive. Michael is always calling tunes that I don't know which forces me to learn them. I enjoy this aspect and also fear it (but i mostly enjoy it). Rob Ewing sat in on trombone and we played "Billies Bounce." I love playing that tune with tenor & bone because it reminds me of the Stan Getz & JJ Johnson recording, a personal favorite of mine since forever ago (it's also a really fun melody).
We will be there again on October 25, please come out and join us!

Lately I have been practicing 26-2 and Giant Steps. I worked on these tunes a lot at one point but than stopped working on them and realized that if you don't continue to work on them they quickly become inaccessible to the fingers. I have been working with vocalist Lorin Benedict and guitarist Eric Vogler who have introduced me to their interesting rythmic concepts and approaches to these tunes, which have been inspired by the music of Steve Coleman and Ravi Coltrane. I am trying to learn how to internalize applying these very difficult changes over these very difficult rhythms. I feel like I can't play anything at all over them yet, but hopefully soon it will get easier. It's amazing stuff to practice, it helps to hear things and feel things differently and to approach improvising in a less conventional way. Then when you play these tunes normally it feels like a relief. Kind of.

Thanks for dropping by, I will update this soon.