PRIM

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BIOGRAPHY

“In spite of all the wild things that are in a flow here, this music always has that calming clarity that otherwise only happens when listening to Bach’s cello suites, but which is also immensely warm.” – Victoriah Szirmai, JAZZTHETIK (DE)

It was the broken coffee machine, the resulting trouble and the sleepy mood that inspired Coffeebean Breakdown. PRIM skillfully pack travels of the bassist into rhythmic soundscapes (Trails) and paint pictures in front of the audience’s eyes. Musical transgressions, classical forms mixed with grooves which are more reminiscent of drum & bass and polymorphous rhythm concepts – PRIM have to share their name with numbers, prayer rituals or cities, but the Viennese trio, consisting of pianist Felix Biller, bassist Martin Melzer and drummer Christoph Karas, is musically unmistakable.

Always searching for the appropriate sound, they are influenced by jazz greats like the Esbjörn Svensson Trio, classical luminaries like Johann Sebastian Bach, new music composers such as John Cage or ethnic music, among others. Nevertheless, they always create something of their own in the end. “Our music is a bit like ordering a scoop of everything at the ice cream parlour and then mixing it wildly,” Martin Melzer explains. From modern jazz to funk and soul to classical, there is something of everything. The trio experiments with sounds and schemes, stories are told with childlike joy, narratives are built up, sounds are sketched – and then broken up again. In doing so, they playfully move between tranquillity and intoxication, volatility and meditative minimalism, fast caffeine flashes and slow coffee indulgences.

Through concerts at home and abroad (e.g. Jazz Fest Wiesen, Nišville Jazz Festival, Æquinox Jazz Festival, Jazzfestival Steyr, jazzahead! Bremen, Lublin Jazz Festival, Intl. Jazz Piano Festival Kalisz, Central European Jazz Showcase Brno, Mladi Ladi Jazz Prag) or tours through China and all of Europe, as well as features or reviews in media such as Ö1 (AT), the Wiener Zeitung (AT), Jazz FM (UK), JazzonPRX (US), WartaJazz (IDN), Jazzpodium (DE), Jazz’halo (BE), Český rozhlas Jazz (CZ) or Jazzit (IT) they have established themselves on the international stage. Founded by Biller, they have been performing together in their current line-up since the end of 2018. With the previous album Garnet Tales, they were already proving their willingness to experiment and are now stepping into a new era of the trio with their latest, highly inventive, record Meridian Steps (2023, Alessa Records).

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