Ken Vandermark and the new wave of Chicago music scene in Amsterdam!

Edition Redux is the most recent project by Ken Vandermark, known for his internationally and critically acclaimed bands such as The Vandermark 5, FME, The Resonance Ensemble, The Territory Band, Made To Break, and Marker. The music of Edition Redux encompasses the full range of Vandermark‘s interests and influences, including experimental jazz, improvisation, post-punk, tropicalism, dub and funk.
The band first performed during a US tour in April 2023 and immediately after this series of concerts recorded their first album at Experimental Sound Studio in Chicago. In addition to Vandermark, who plays saxophones and clarinet in the project, the quartet consists of Erez Dessel (keyboards), Lily Finnegan (drums) and Beth McDonald (tuba/electronics) from the new wave of the Chicago music scene.

TERRIE EX (e-guitar)
Aka Terrie Hessels, born in Westzaan, 12 October 1954. Started playing guitar when he co-founded The Ex in 1979. Some 1900+ concerts with The Ex ever since. Next to all The Ex releases, he started free-improvising from the very start. From a little guitarsolo on the Awara/Ex 7″ in 1981, till recent tours with Han Bennink or impro-groups Offonoff or Lean Left (with Ken Vandermark, Andy Moor and Paal Nilssen-Love). Starts in 2000 the TERP label, for his own impro-projects and African Music. Produced CDs with Tsehaytu Beraki, Getatchew Mekuria, Konono No.1 and Mohammed Jimmy Mohammed; 25+ releases thus far.

How fortunate I am and what a privilege it is to go out to play became very clear in 2020 and 2021, and I’m not going to forget that. I never took it for granted, but certainly now it’s more precious than ever.
—Ken Vandermark

Ken Vandermark (USA 1964) is an improvising musician and composer who plays tenor and baritone saxophone, Bb and bass clarinet. He moved to Chicago from Boston in 1989, and has worked from the early 1990s onward, both as a performer and organizer in North America and Europe, recording in an array of contexts with many internationally renowned musicians (such as Fred Anderson, Ab Baars, Peter Brötzmann, Sylvie Courvoisier, Tim Daisy, Kris Davis, Dieb 13, Hamid Drake, Mats Gustafsson, Elisabeth Harnik, Steve Heather, Didi Kern, Kent Kessler, Paul Lytton, Joe McPhee, Andy Moor, Jason Moran, Ikue Mori, Joe Morris, Eddie Prevóst, Mette Rasmussen, Tom Rainey, Eric Revis, Jasper Stadhouders, Chad Taylor, and John Tilbury).

His current group activity includes the bands Bent Atlas, Lean Left, The DKV Trio, DEK, his large ensemble Entr’acte, the ongoing Momentum projects; duos with Terrie Ex, Christof Kurzmann, Damon Locks, Paal Nilssen-Love, Mars Williams, and Nate Wooley; and work as a solo performer. Ken co-founded Catalytic Sound in 2012, an organization dedicated to the economic sustainability of creative improvising musicians, and since then has been its director. In 2014 he began Audiographic Records, an independent music label. Since June of 2015 Ken has been co-curator of Option, a music and interview series held at Experimental Sound Studio in Chicago. Half of each year is spent touring in Europe, North America, Latin America, and Japan; his concerts and numerous recordings have been critically acclaimed at home and abroad. Ken‘s activity as a writer includes liner notes for a variety of recordings; and contributions to the eighth edition of John Zorn‘s Arcana: musicians on music, the music journal Sound American, the Spanish language periodical, “El Estado Mental,” and “Catalytic Quarterly.” In 1999 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in music.

Erez Dessel is an improviser, pianist, composer, and educator. After winning multiple Downbeat Student Music Awards, Dessel moved to Boston to study at the New England Conservatory of Music (NEC), where he worked with a host of jazz luminaries, including Billy Hart, Ethan Iverson, and Jason Moran. As an educator, he led his quartet to perform and teach in over 50 workshops in the Boston area and was also selected to bring his group to the Virginia Arts Festival. After graduating from NEC in 2020, Dessel moved to Savannah, GA to accept the position of music director at the Savannah Music Festival Jazz Academy, Savannah’s first and only free after-school youth jazz program. He currently lives in Chicago, where he’s performed with a host of improvising musicians at venues indulging the Hungry Brain and Elastic Arts. Dessel’s music is centered around exploring improvisation, graphic notation, and polyrhythmic structures. He frequently works with cassette tapes and is currently developing ways to paint with the piano using charcoal, pastel, paper, and linen.

Lily Finnegan is a Chicago born and based drummer, composer and improviser. In 2021 she earned a Master of Music from Berklee College of Music in Boston Massachusetts. She received a full scholarship to participate in the Berklee Global Jazz Institute, a 20 person international cadre of musicians led by Danilo Perez. At Berklee she was also part of the Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice. Here she was mentored by Terri Lyne Carrington, Kris Davis, and Linda May Han Oh. She’s worked on projects with Carrington including Music for Abolition as part of the Visualizing Abolition Exhibit at University of California Santa Cruz. In 2022 Lily returned to Chicago where she is involved in various creative groups and projects.

Beth McDonald is a classically trained tuba player gone awry. She performs mainly as an improviser, using the tuba acoustically and with electronic effects pedals. Densing (2021), her most recent album, uses tuba and electronics in conjunction with natural acoustic resonance to build up unpredictable new layers of sound. In a previous musical life, Beth toured as a contemporary classical musician, chamber musician, and soloist. She also participated in orchestral academies at the Lucerne Festival, Aspen Music Festival, and the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, and was on staff at the Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice.

https://vandermark1.bandcamp.com/