Axel Dörner / Beat Keller – Aphanite

1. Andesite (25:17)
2. Basalt (3:47)
3. Diorite (21:20)
4. Gabbro (9:57)
5. Rhyolite (5:34)

· Axel Dörner: trumpet, electronics
· Beat Keller: feedbacker electric guitar, acoustic guitar

All music by Axel Dörner (GEMA) & Beat Keller (SUISA)
Tracks 1-3 were recorded at Lagerstudios in Winterthur, Switzerland on 5-6/2/2023
Tracks 4-5 were recorded at Theater Neuwiesenhof in Winterthur, Switzerland on 7/2/2023
Edited and mixed by Beat Keller at Lagerstudios in Winterthur, Switzerland
Mastered by Martin Siewert
Cover artworks The Face and The Shovel by Michel Pretterklieber
Photo by Carina Khorkhordina
Graphic design by László Szakács
Produced by László Juhász
Special thanks to Pro Helvetia, Schweizer Kulturstiftung & Lotteriefonds Kanton Thurgau for their kind support

Released: January 2024 / first edition of 300 cds
Direct purchase: Bandcamp / Discogs

REVIEWS ↓

“Also quite long is the CD by Axel Dörner (trumpet, electronics) and Beat Keller (feedbacker electric guitar, acoustic guitar). They recorded three pieces over two days is a studio in Switzerland in February 2023 and a day after they played a concert and recorded two further pieces. From Dörner I reviewed various works over the many years he’s active in the field of improvised music, but only once concerning Beat Keller (Vital Weekly 1056). If the Minton and Mezei disc is the more traditional side of improvised music, here we are going into a stranger side of that kind music. Sure, there is enough here that is easily classified as improvised music, but because of the electronics involved, the music takes a left turn at times, and finds itself screaming and bursting with noise, piercingly loud. The two don’t back away to have something sustaining going on for more than a few seconds. This I think is due to the use of electronics on the side of Dörner and the feedback of Keller, but also in their treatment of the instruments. At times they make it sound like a percussion instrument, like bells, like the crumbling of a newspaper, or going all gentle, and making it sound like a guitar and a trumpet. As said, nothing stays very long in the same place, and within seconds/minutes, they are somewhere else, in an entirely different land, as it were. I assume many lovers of more traditional improvised music find this too harsh, too noisy and too crude, and I can’t blame them. Had I not heard a fair share of noise music in my life, I would too, but following music defining years in power electronics and industrial music, I think these musicians do a great job at doing a kind of noise music that isn’t about pure noise, but works with the dynamics of noise.” / Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly, 12 March 2024

“Beat Keller est un guitariste Suisse crédité ici feedbacker electric guitar et acoustic guitar. Son collègue est le légendaire trompettiste Berlinois Axel Dörner, qui outre le fait d’incarner brillamment la trompette radicale improvisée est aussi un solide créateur de jazz avec le groupe Die Entauschung et le projet Monk’s Casino du pianiste Alex von Schlippenbach.

« Une roche aphanitique (ou de texture aphanitique), ou aphanite, est une roche à grain très fin, dont les cristaux sont trop petits pour être visibles à l’oeil nu. Les roches dont les cristaux sont visibles à l’œil nu (ce sont des phonolitiques) sont dites phanéritiques. En fonction de leur vitesse de refroidissement et de cristallisation les roches volcaniques (ou extrusives) peuvent être aphanitiques (refroidissement et cristallisation rapides donnant de très petits cristaux) ou phanéritiques (refroidissement lent formant de plus gros cristaux), alors que les roches plutoniques (ou intrusives) sont toujours phanéritiques (cristallisation beaucoup plus lente). Les aphanites étaient utilisées par les artisans du Néolithique pour fabriquer des haches et d’autres outils. » Les titres : Basalt, Diorite, Gabbro, Rhyolite et Andesite, font référence à ces minéraux, même si je ne vois pas très bien la relation, si ce n’est que la musique est spécialement intéressante. On peut dire sans se tromper qu’Axel Dörner est un exceptionnel explorateur des propriétés sonores de la trompette, comme ses collègues Birgit Ulher et Franz Hautzinger ou l’Américain Peter Evans. Axel utilise le souffle pur qu’on entend vibrer dans les tubes sans émettre une note, avec d’infinies variations aux nuances infinitésimales, bruitages multiples, dérapages et quand il émet des sonorités qui ressemblent à des notes, ce sont les plus étranges, aiguës, harmoniques extrêmes, gargouillis etc… Le bruit fait corps à une expression musicale d’un autre type. Beat Keller alterne la guitare acoustique avec les effets électroniques de sa guitare électrique, instrument utilisé plutôt que source sonore que comme « instrument joué plus conventionnellement ». Il s’en suit des paysages sonores à la fois animés d’une subtile variété et qui semblent statiques, méticuleux. La virtuosité est mise de côté pour se concentrer sur une approche empathique dissimulée derrière leurs processus sonores différenciés. Le guitariste s’ingénie à brouiller les pistes en multipliant toutes sortes d’occurrences sonores dans lesquelles le souffleur s’inscrit imperturbablement, sans sourciller, sérieux comme un pape. Leur duo incarne un réel contraste entre leurs deux pratiques instrumentales et leurs correspondances évidentes ou secrètes font surtout appel à l’imagination et à la sensibilité de l’auditeur. On peut trouver un enregistrement récent plus convaincant d’Axel Dörner comme Confined Movement avec Tomaž Grom ou avec le trio DDK dans A Right To Silence (avec Jacques Demierre et Jonas Köcher) ou son duo Stonecipher avec Mark Sanders (à mon avis. Mais quand même, cet aphanite est faite d’une pierre rare.” / Jean-Michel Van Schouwburg, Orynx-improv’andsounds, 5 April 2024

“Aphanite documents the meeting of two idiosyncratic and experienced free improvisers – German, Berlin-based trumpeter-electronics player Axel Dörner, who has developed a completely different language for the trumpet as well as inventive, extended techniques that make use of breath and microscopic sounds as much as conventional note-playing, with Swiss guitarist-sound engineer Beat Keller, who is based in Winterthur, Switzerland, and Berlin, who has developed a unique musical language based on the use of an electric feedback guitar, and extended playing techniques and unconventional guitar tunings. Aphanite is the debut album of the duo and it was recorded at Lagerstudios (the first three pieces) and Theater Neuwiesenhof (the last two pieces) in Winterthur in February 2023 and edited and mixed by Keller.

Dörner and Keller met in Berlin and have been playing together as a duo since 2020. The title of the album and its five pieces describe fine-grained rocks containing minerals that cannot be distinguished with the naked eye, and all tell about the spirit of this meeting. The unusual and enigmatic music of Dörner and Keller is defined by their unconventional approaches to the trumpet and the guitar, enhanced by extended techniques and special electronic effects, that transform the instruments into otherworldly sound generations.

But Dörner and Keller are more than mad sonic scientists. Their electro-acoustic, sound-oriented conversations are highly nuanced and restless and employ elements of experimental music, contemporary music and abstract and industrial-like noises but balance cleverly and sometimes even playfully these indescribable sounds while suggesting an organic flow. The deep listening essence of this meeting keeps the mysterious audible dimension of the unpredictable sonic frictions and events and allows Dörner and Keller to weave complex, layered textures, that are subversive, thoughtful and stimulating at the same time, and often morphing into one sonic entity.” / Eyal Hareuveni, Salt Peanuts*, 10 April 2024

RADIO PLAYS ↓

· No Wave at Tilos Rádió, Budapest, 1 September 2024