Week of Surprise: Julien Desprez's Abacaxi // Sofia Jernberg & Alex Hawkins

A Week of Surprise full of musical surprises, diversions, oases and discoveries. Due to the current Corona situation, the Cologne festival "Night of Surprise", will take place as a six-day festival, including not only the Stadtgarten but also other concert venues such as the Christuskirche and the Galerie Martina Kaiser. The program of this interim format focuses on niches of the European musical landscape and projects of some darlings of the last festival editions, on local projects and new collaborations in more concert-like formats.

ABACAXI Sound Art Rock' Roll
Julien Despre - guitar, light, composition / Jean-François Riffaud - electric bass / Francesco Pastacaldi - drums, synth
"A heart full of candy and a skin made of spikes." Garish, sharp-edged, high-density - with its melange of late 1960s rock, funk and noise, ABACAXI is a postmodern sparkling incarnation of the classic rock trio. The band around the extraordinary guitarist Julien Desprez, who just provided one of the absolute highlights of Cologne Jazzweek with Mopcut, is a highly energetic electric sound sculpture.

Sofia Jernberg & Alexander Hawkins Contemporary Ethiopian Folk
Sofia Jernberg - voice / Alexander Hawkins - piano
Luminous melodies. Finest vocal ramifications. Harmonic upheavals. Floating hymns. The tenderness, musical precision and depth with which pianist Alexander Hawkins and experimental vocalist Sofia Jernberg dedicate themselves to Ethiopian songs is extraordinary.

Jernberg's work - whether in Schoenberg's "Pierrot Lunaire" or Mats Gustafsson's Fire! Orchestra - often takes her to the extreme limits of vocal technique. Alexander Hawkins is a creative driving force on the European scene. In addition to his own projects as a bandleader and composer, he works with Evan Parker, Louis Moholo-Moholo, Joe McPhee and Tomeka Reid, among others.