Reaching for the utmost limits – Making a process visible with The Hands, the Bow, and the Bass by Johannes Nästesjö

Can I, by reaching for the utmost limits on my instrument, in dynamically, technically and pitch related ways both find, for me, new contemporary techniques and expand the ways on how to play and perform them on the double bass? Can I, by illuminating, documenting, studying, organizing and re-documenting my musical process, design a toolkit for improvising bassists with contemporary techniques? Can I, in my musical process both act as the first person, i.e. the subjective musician and as the third person, i.e. the objective observer?  If so, can I, as the observer objectively observe and organize the ”discoveries” that I am doing in my daily work as first person. Can I create this tool kit through the limitations that my instrument offers acoustically (the hand, the bow and the bass). And can I through this immerse and widen my musical expressions? - A richer language - more elastic - with more colors.

Final Concert

I will present my final concert on June 21st, 17.00–18.00, in the Concert Hall at RMC. The first set will be a solo performance and the second set will be played together with my dear friend and musical role model Sten Sandell.

Since most of my research, as you can see on my timeline, was based around solo and duo performances, it felt very natural to present a solo–duo concert. I am so happy and honored that Sten wanted to celebrate this special occasion with me. I had the great privilege to get to know Sten through my studies at RMC. His help and knowledge, as a musician, as a researcher and as a human being, became a indispensable in this project. And as a duo, we will release the album we recorded with the help of RMC later this Autumn.

The music will be improvised, and rooted around the thoughts, philosophies, and techniques that I have described in this paper.

The concert will, of course, be documented, and my plan is to analyze in hope to find some new ““happy mistakes”, transformations of old ideas, and maybe some new ideas will be born.

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