Alex Zethson / Johan Jutterström - It Could / If I
A joint release from US label Astral Spirits (Austin, Texas) and Thanatosis Produktion (Stockholm), It could / If I is the first album from Stockholm-based, longstanding duo Johan Jutterström (saxophone) and Alex Zethson (piano). In addition to the duo’s own reimaginations of a few so called jazz standards, it contains songs by artists such as Leonard Cohen, Pet Shop Boys, John Lurie, and German 19th century composer Alexander Fesca. As a prequel to the full-length album (which is being released on LP, CD and digitally), a very limited edition 7”-single is being released, with two live-versions of songs from the album, recorded by the Swedish Radio.
It must always be night otherwise they wouldn't need the lights
– Thelonious Monk
x∞1x=0 shows that the function of 1x (f(x)=1x) tends toward 0 as x tends toward infinity. Likewise f(x)=1x tends to infinity as x tends towards 0. The function something can reach towards infinity when the value that it is a function of gets smaller and smaller moving toward zero.
That you can play less to achieve more has been proven over and over again in music. One example of that is the 15th lesson that Steve Lacy wrote down as he learned from Thelonious Monk: "What you don't play can be more important than what you do". As you listen to this record the 10th lesson he wrote down might also come to mind but perhaps more as a mood or temperament: "It must always be night otherwise they wouldn't need the lights"
The point is jazz music.
Alex Zethson and Johan Jutterström met many years ago when they were young, right before they started their studies at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. Still in their teens, they found common ground in their shared love for jazz music and a want to play it, but also in their anxieties in trying to find a way to approach it. This shared love, want and anxiety laid the foundation of how they have come to play together – always trying to stick it, and when that fails, find another approach – another way to get to play it, another chance. They have collaborated in many different groups playing everything from improvised- to folk music, but as a duo it has always been about jazz music and the disappointment of never feeling quite happy about one's performance.
It could / If I
Similarly to x∞1x=0, an asymptote of a curve is a line such that the distance between the curve and the line approaches zero as one or both of the x or y coordinates tends to infinity. Another way of phrasing that is to say that an asymptote is a straight line that constantly approaches a given curve but does not meet it at any infinite distance.
On this record what tunes are played somehow matters less than how they are played. The next to arbitrary choice of playing songs with titles that start with either It could or If I is given meaning only after that choice is made, when there's something to play – during the rearranging of them, and more importantly – during the playing of them. Everything from standards heavily rearranged into disparate etudes to original compositions. In a sense approaching them somewhat like palimpsests; scrubbing away at the songs in order to add new meaning to them while hoping that what was will still be possible to make out. Then, perhaps, it can start to make sense. Love, want and anxiety – trying to stick jazz music, constantly approaching it, constantly getting closer but never meeting it at any infinite distance: "It could have been very very beautiful, if I only …"
ARTIST BIOGRAPHIES
Alex Zethson (b 1988) is a Stockholm-based keyboardist and composer. He’s been active as a touring and recording artist since 2009, when he graduated from the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, and first started touring with free-jazz sextet Je Suis! In 2016, Zethson was the first – and still only – non classically trained pianist to receive the Rosenborg-Gehrman study grant, which is one of the biggest grants in Scandinavia.
Apart from his solo work and his own ensembles (like Vathres, Yokada, VÖ and Alex Zethson Ensemble), he frequently records with Sven Wunder and tours internationally with groups like Fire! Orchestra, Angles, Mariam the Believer and Goran Kajfes Tropiques. He has also played in several projects with Norrbotten Big Band and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra. Recently he both produced and performed on the record In This Forever Unfolding Moment (Vilhelm Bromander) that got 5/5 from DownBeat Magazine, as well as on The Death of Kalypso (Angles & Elle-Kari) which received a 5/5 review from freejazz-blog.
To this day, Zethson participates on more than 50 albums. His own works have been published on, e.g., SUPERPANG, Defkaz, disorder, Relative Pitch Records, Supertraditional, Hubro and Clean Feed; while his playing is also heard on recordings published by labels such as Repeat Until Death, Rune Grammofon, Umlaut Records, Piano Piano, Headspin and WeJazz.
Drawn to wider community-building musical activities as well, Zethson is running the label Thanatosis produktion since 2016, a label with 35 titles in the catalogue by fall 2024. He’s also continuously organizing concerts and festivals – such as MONOPIANO festival and Stockholm Nu Festival – plus dedicated label nights in Sweden and abroad.
Johan Jutterström (b 1987) is a Stockholm-based saxophonist. He started playing the saxophone when he was very young under the tutelage of his father who is a jazz pianist. He was accepted into Sweden's most esteemed youth big band as the youngest band member of the constellation at the time and had the opportunity to play together with Swedish guest stars and alumni at a young age.
He has studied in Sweden (The royal college of music in Stockholm and the Academy of music and drama in Gothenburg), Paris (CNSMDP) and Norway, and has an artistic PhD in music from the Norwegian artistic research programme, University of Stavanger. After his doctoral studies he was part of the artistic research group Lethe at Stockholm university of the arts, funded by the Swedish research council, that studied forgetfulness as artistic method and guiding principle for an artistic process.
Jutterström plays on several records, e.g. Crime Scenes’ Acksjöns kapell (FMR Record 2009), J/L Duo’s albums Lovsång och hemlighet/Cerchio(Olof Bright 2011), Lethe (Fireworks Edition Records 2018) and Ismalfa (Thanatosis 2020), and STHLM svaga’s two albums Bells and whistles (Found You Recordings 2019) and Plays Carter, Plays Mitchell, Plays Shepp (Thanatosis 2024).
He has received several commissions that have been performed at GöteborgsOperan as a sound installation at the entrance hall and Röda Stens konsthall in Gothenburg, Roulette in NYC and Carriageworks in Sydney during two iterations of the Resonant Bodies festival, among other scenes, and he has presented his artistic research at the Venice Biennale 2017.
With the group STHLM svaga he has commissioned music from among others Carla Bley, Roscoe Mitchell, Ron Carter and Archie Shepp, deepening the collaboration with Ron Carter through his presence in the studio during the recording of the piece that was commissioned by him. Jutterström has toured internationally with many groups including STHLM svaga that also has received 5/5 from Sweden's biggest newspaper Dagens Nyheter.
