DeutschIncense of Music 31
A multisensory concert – Friday, 15 March 2019, 8 pm
Chris Dahlgren: vocals, guitar, viola da gamba, composition
Evi Filippou: percussion, background vocals
Arne Braun: electric guitar
Sidney Werner: bass, background vocals
Incense: Elemi, White Sage
Ausland, Lychener Strasse 60, 10437 Berlin
Incense of Music, a series focused on highest musical quality, continues its intimate and multi-sensory journey into the unknown, presenting the music and songs of Chris Dahlgren, supported by his band — Evi Filippou on percussion and background vocals, Arne Braun on electric guitar, and Sidney Werner on bass. Between idiosyncratic songwriting and improvisational freedom, an evening unfolds that brings Dahlgren's distinctive sound world vividly to life. Of course, in conjunction with smoked scent molecules from two selected plants: elemi and white sage. It will be an amazing evening.
For guests who are particularly sensitive to smoke, this event is not recommended.
Artists
Chris Dahlgren — vocals, guitar, viola da gamba, composition
Chris Dahlgren was born in New York, NY, on 13 November 1961. He began with music on the cello at the age of six, and later switched to the bass. His earliest experiments with improvisation on the cello brought upon him the wrath of his elementary school music teacher, who shouted, "Get out of here, Dahlgren — you will never be a musician!" He received his BM in Jazz Studies from the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music (1986) and an MA in Composition/Experimental Music from Wesleyan University (2003). Chris studied composition with La Monte Young, Anthony Braxton, Alvin Lucier, and Christian Wolff, and studied bass with Barry Green, François Rabbath, and Dave Holland, among others. During the mid-1980s, as the in-house bassist of the Blue Wisp Jazz Club in Cincinnati, Ohio, Chris had the opportunity to learn about jazz music directly from some of the greatest American masters, such as Herb Ellis, Red Rodney, John von Ohlen, Art Lande, Charles Tolliver, and Joe Lovano. During this time he also established himself as a composer and unique voice on the bass, co-founding the band Ekimi and the music label Krysdahlark. In 1993, Chris moved back to his native New York, and for eleven years was actively performing and recording with his own bands (Slow Commotion, Best Intentions) as well as others' on the Downtown scene. From 2001 to 2009 he was a regular member of ensembles led by the seminal avant-garde composer and woodwinds player Anthony Braxton. Since 2004, he has been living in Berlin, Germany, performing, composing, and collaborating with significant European musicians, composers, and artists. In 2006 Chris began to play the viola da gamba, and has since introduced this instrument into the field of improvised music. In 2008, he formed his band LEXICON, whose debut recording was released on the Jazzwerkstatt label in March 2010. Since 2003, Chris has taught and coached ensembles in Berlin at the Musikhochschule Hanns Eisler and the Jazz Institut Berlin. He has received numerous grants and awards in music composition from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Ohio Arts Council, and the Headlands Arts Center (USA), as well as commissions from private individuals and organizations.
Evi Filippou — percussion, background vocals
Evi Filippou (GR, b. 1993) started taking percussion lessons at the age of seven. In 2009 she gave her first recitals in Athens with a scholarship from the Friends of Music. Two years later, she graduated with a first prize and moved to Berlin to begin her Bachelor's studies at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler. She has performed with, among others, the Bolshoi Ballet Orchestra, the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, and the Orchestra of Konzerthaus Berlin. Evi is a founding member of Opera Lab Berlin, an independent ensemble specializing in music theater, with which she premiered a piece by Salvatore Sciarrino at the Staatsoper Berlin. In 2015 she played a solo concert in the series "Welcome Young Artists!" in Athens. Together with saxophonist Hayden Chisholm, she founded a duo playing both contemporary and original compositions; they perform around the world and released their duo album "Blowslap." Evi also plays in many pop, jazz, and theater projects.
Arne Braun — electric guitar
Arne Braun, born 1995 in Jakobstad, Finland, is a Finnish musician with the electric guitar as his main instrument. He lives in Berlin where he is active on the scene in various bands and projects, playing both in Berlin and other cities around Germany. Besides Germany and Finland, where he regularly performs, he has also played in Iceland, France, Sweden, Italy, and the Netherlands. Notable festivals he has performed at include the Reykjavik Jazz Festival, Umbria Jazz Festival, Pori Jazz Festival, and MaerzMusik. He recently graduated from the Jazz Institute Berlin (UdK/Hanns Eisler), where during his studies he received lessons from Greg Cohen, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Kalle Kalima, Chris Dahlgren, Jim Black, John Hollenbeck, Marc Muellbauer, and more. In the last five years he has had the opportunity to play and perform with some of his favourite musicians, including Morgan Ågren, Jim Black, Pat Mastelotto, Greg Cohen, and many more.
Sidney Werner — bass, background vocals
Incense
Elemi is the resin of Canarium luzonicum, a tropical evergreen tree in the family Burseraceae — the same family that produces frankincense and myrrh. The genus Canarium comprises around 100 tropical and subtropical tree species, distributed from West Africa across South and Southeast Asia to the Pacific islands; the trees can reach 40 to 50 metres in height. Incisions in the bark release a soft, pale yellow, honey-like resin, from which the essential elemi oil is steam-distilled.
The name elemi is thought to derive from an Arabic phrase meaning "as above, so below" — a nod to the hermetic principle, said to reflect the resin's sublime effect on mood and spirit. Elemi has long been used in traditional medicine across Southeast Asia and in ancient Egypt, including in embalming. In European pharmacy it was for centuries a valued ingredient in wound-healing balms and salves, and remains used in herbal medicine today for bronchitis, catarrh, persistent coughing, and skincare. Commercially, the resin is also used in varnishes, lacquers, and certain printing inks.
Burned as incense, elemi releases a fresh, sharp, citrusy-resinous scent with hints of pine needles — brighter and more lemon-like than classic frankincense. It is associated with mental clarity and an invigorating, refreshing effect.
White sage (Salvia apiana), also known as bee sage or sacred sage, is an evergreen perennial shrub native to the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, particularly the coastal sage scrub habitats of Southern California and Baja California, along the western edges of the Mojave and Sonoran deserts. It typically grows 1.3 to 1.5 metres tall, with whitish-green, evergreen leaves densely covered in fine hairs that hold aromatic oils — an adaptation to the aridity of its habitat. In spring, several flower stalks, sometimes pinkish, rise above the foliage bearing white to pale lavender flowers that strongly attract bees — hence the species name "apiana." The plant grows on dry slopes in coastal sage scrub, chaparral, and yellow-pine forests up to roughly 1,500 metres in elevation.
For numerous Indigenous peoples of California, white sage has been a sacred plant for generations, known by its own name in each language — qaashil (Luiseño), shlhtaay (Kumeyaay), kasiile (Tongva), we'wey (Chumash), and qas'ily (Cahuilla), among others. Its seeds were a main ingredient of pinole, a traditional staple food; the Cahuilla harvested large quantities, mixing them with wheat flour and sugar for gruel or biscuits, while the Chumash and other tribes also ate the leaves and stems. Some tribes used the seeds to remove foreign objects from the eye, while Cahuilla women brewed a root tea for strength and healing after childbirth. The leaves have also long been burned by many Indigenous peoples in purification ceremonies and spiritual practice. In recent decades, growing commercial demand has led to overharvesting of wild populations, prompting many Indigenous communities and conservationists to ask that only cultivated — not wild-harvested — plants be used, and that the plant be treated with respect.
The dried leaves are traditionally bundled into smudge sticks and burned, releasing a strongly aromatic, herbaceous, camphor-like scent with a faint sweetness. Its smoke is believed to have cleansing properties, clearing negative energy from a space and promoting mental clarity and relaxation.