ECM

JACOB YOUNG 
Sideways

ECM 1727080

Release date: 12 November 2007    Music style: Jazz

Jacob Young: acoustic and electric guitars;
Mathias Eick: trumpet;
Vidar Johansen: tenor saxophone, bass clarinet;
Mats Eilertsen: double-bass;
Jon Christensen: drums

Sales Points:

• Evening Falls, the ECM debut of Jacob Young catapulted the Norwegian-American guitarist to international attention in 2004: “Sounds how Pat Metheny might have, had he grown up in Norway instead of the American Midwest” (All about Jazz)
• Young has developed a clear identity on three fronts: as guitarist, as writer of memorably melodic material, and as bandleader of originality - all are evident on Sideways
• Features the same distinguished group drawing on three generations of Norwegian jazz – who each shave the pace to stretch out, inside Young’s open, attractive tunes
• Especially strong showcase for Young’s acoustic guitar playing, featured on six tracks

• Music/Artist background:  Second album by widely-praised Norwegian/American guitarist
  Jacob Young, Sideways features the working band first heard on Evening Falls (981 1780), a group established to reflect the compatible styles and ideas of three generations of Norwegian jazz players, the age range of the band stretching from 28 (prize-winning trumpeter Mathias Eick) to 64 (veteran drumming genius Jon Christensen). For the group Young writes songs “with a lot of room for melodic interplay and improvisation”.

Born in Lillehammer in 1970, Jacob Young was introduced to jazz by his American father and at 12 he took up the guitar. After Oslo University, he received a scholarship to the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in Manhattan. In New York he studied with Jim Hall and John Abercrombie. Back in Norway he issued three albums for local labels with supporting musicians including Nils Petter Molvær, Trygve Seim, Arve Henriksen, Christian Wallumrød, and Jarle Vespestad - names familiar to ECM listeners. Producer Manfred Eicher first heard him play live with Trygve Seim’s group at Oslo’s Blå Club in the late 1990s. On Sideways Young plays acoustic guitar on the title track and on “Near South End”, “Hanna’s Lament” and “Maybe We Can”. The closing piece, “Gazing At Stars”, features Jacob on both his steel-string acoustic and on classical guitar.

Vidar Johansen, who previously played in Oslo 13 under Jon Balke’s direction, was a mainstay of the Norwegian jamming scene in the 70s. Jon Christensen – “a European institution of modern drumming, a master of music, probably the most influential musician of his generation” says Young – has been an ECM recording artist since 1970. Mathias Eick has become one of the new ‘stars’ of Norwegian music since Evening Falls. Bassist Mats Eilertsen has worked since 1996 with Jacob Young who describes him as “one of the most wonderful musicians to have emerged in Norway in recent years”.

Tracks:

• (1) Sideways 6.41 *

• (2) Time Rebel 5.14

• (3) Slow Bo-Bo 5.07

• (4) Near South End 5.26

• (5) Out Of Night 10.16

• (6) Hanna’s Lament 4.02 *

• (7) St. Ella 4.35

• (8) Maybe We Can 6.53

• (9) Wide Asleep 5.30 *

• (10) Gazing At Stars 2.03 *

Recommended listening *

Total time: 56.22