Bernt Rosengren

[Larry Kart]

Any thoughts on him? Best recordings? I was led to listen to some things on Spotify and was intrigued. An individual voice, I thought. Especially nice "speaking" tone, somewhat akin to Harold Land's at times, I thought. Would have liked to acquire Rosengren's Lars Gullin tribute album "Late Date" but was daunted by the price -- more than $500! BTW, on "Late Date" there's a Gullin piece with a great 1950s title, "Decent Eyes."

[relyles]

Years ago a friend turned me on to Rosengren and I have enjoyed what I heard. I wish I had more recent examples of his playing to cite, but I recall really enjoying Notes From Underground which was by his mid seventies ensemble featuring tommy Koverhult. I have also heard a more recent recording by Summit Meeting titled Bent's Jump, which has more inside playing by Rosengren that I vaguely recall enjoying.

[Niko]

i like most of what i've heard, Stockholm Dues, Notes from Underground, Lars Werner's Bombastica (there's a great Dragon CD with iirc additional material), the recordings with Komeda...

a great album/collections of tapes that's easy to miss is trumpeter Lalle Svensson's I Should Care which has a group led by Rosengren on all tracks except the first one, this should also be available on spotify...

[Head Man]

He plays well with Arne Domnerus on "Face to Face".

It's on Dragon so hopefully won't cost $500.

[CraigP]

I love his playing on George Russell's Live At Beethoven Hall. I think he's on some other Russell recordings that were releases on BS/SN.

[Bluesnik]

I have his big band album Bernt Rosengren Big Band from 1977, which I like a lot.

[Clunky]

His music is frustratingly hard to find. "Notes from the underground" was on CD but it's expensive if you can find it and omits a track from the LP

Both this and "Late Date" are on amazon UK as downloads, I'm getting tempted to break my duck and go for these.

Plays Evert Taube is good , I like Face to Face but its not exactly revolutionary.

[Peter Friedman]

I have quite a number of CDs with Bernt Rosengren as leader or sideman.

As Leader

Summit Meeting - Dragon

Late Date : A Tribute To Lars Gullin - Mirrors

Inside Pictures : A Tribute To Lars Gullin, Vol.II - Mirrors

Surprise Party - Steeplechase

As A Sideman with a Significant Role

Maffy Falay Sextet - Hank's Time - Liphone

Doug Raney Sextet - Meeting The Tenors - Criss cross

Doug Raney Quintet - Cuttin' Loose - Steeplechase

Doug Raney Quartet - Listen - Steeplechase

Doug Raney Quintet - I'll Close My Eyes - Steeplechase

Doug Raney Quintet - Lazy Bird - Steeplechase

Arne Domnerus - Face To Face - Dragon

Sideman with a Small Role

Nils Lindberg - Saxes Galore/Brass Galore - Bluebell

Lars Gullin - Bluesport - EMI Odeon

Lars Gullin - Aeros Aromatic Atomica Suite - EMI Odeon

Edited April 30, 2013 by Peter Friedman

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, hard to find the earlier work on CD but very rewarding. The material with Lasse Werner that came out as a Jazzland LP is, I believe, now available on a Dragon CD and is well worth seeking out. Numerous alternates and additional music really line the platter there.

Stockholm Dues is his second LP as a leader and is excellent. It was reissued on CD a while back (as well as going through a few different vinyl iterations). Agreed about the groups with Tommy Koverhult (1968-early '80s?) being real strong. The quartet variant that cut Fly Me To The Sun (Torbjörn Hultcrantz, Leif Wennerstrom) was really something; there are also two strong LPs on Amigo (one adding Bobo Stenson) and half of an LP for Sveriges Radio - the latter a pretty monstrous performance.

I've spent less time with the big band work than I should, but can recommend First Moves (EMI Odeon LP) as a knottily robust and rhythmically charged date. I still would rather hear him in a small group or, if in an orchestral setting, under someone else's direction.

Sideman work: In addition to some earlier sessions with Krzyzstof Komeda (who I have explored less than I should), Maffy Falay & Sevda rules as far as "non-Western jazz" goes, in my opinion, and the first of two volumes on Caprice has some killer Rosengren in that context.

Rosengren also worked with Don Cherry pretty frequently; the fruits of that can be heard on Improvisationer (scarce LP on SJR) and Movement Incorporated, a big band date released on the small Stockholm label Anagram (CD only). Orangutang!, led by saxophonist/arranger Gunnar Lindquist, is an excellent Cherry-inspired workshop big band date that's rare (Odeon Swe LP) but worth seeking out. George Russell was also seemingly quite integral to Rosengren's evolution as a player/composer and the saxophonist is on a number of Russell's Scandinavian sessions.

I recently picked up a Harvest LP under Benny Bailey's name that has some very strong Rosengren playing. It's titled How Deep Can You Go?. At times he sounds like Joe Henderson on that record, though I wouldn't say he always does. He's a robust player who amalgamated a highly structured form of post-bop improvising into relatively free (to very free) contexts and was successful at it. Clearly Rosengren was more comfortable with a somewhat regimented harmonic environment as his later records are more "in" than "out."

[king ubu]

I've enjoyed his playing wherever I could get hold of him ... not too many discs around, but some listening versions and stuff (including "Notes from the Underground", time to resurrect the bytes).

I think I first heard him on Stanko's "Litania", the great Komeda tribute on ECM. Next was probably his playing in Polanski's "Knife in the Water". Magic stuff!

One I really enjoy, although it's got a rather bad rep (it IS noisy and dirty, but life is, too, so ...) is "Free Jam", the Ayler release of two discs worth of jams by Mongezi Feza and Rosengren's avantgarde jazz band of those days (early seventies):

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, that Feza is an enjoyable one - I agree.

[Homefromtheforest]

I have and enjoy "notes from the underground", "fly me to the sun", and "orangutang!"..would love to hear more of his stuff from around this era. I Wish I had deep pockets to collect his releases on the Bird Notes label!!

[clifford_thornton]

Frippe Nordstrom was the one who did Bird Notes - indeed, I only have one of the variants of Natural Music (clean orig) as well as the Ayler vol. 1 (Japanese). What was cool about Frippe was that he put different music on different pressings of the same release, so the cover and title might be the same but who knows what you were going to get music-wise? The dead-wax was the only giveaway! Someday I hope all of his Bird Notes releases are collected into a boxed set.

[Homefromtheforest]

Oops you are so right...I knew that. Perhaps it's best not to post to this forum while having a few India pale ales;)

[clifford_thornton]

Ha, that is the ONLY way to post!

[Д.Д.]

Was listening to some Rosengren today, and decided to read his Wikipedia entry - only to discover that he died a couple of days ago.  

Edited May 16, 2023 by Д.Д.

[Daniel A]

Sad, but maybe not unexpected. Obituaries in main Swedish newspapers do not state on which day he passed, but some sources say yesterday, May 15.

[Rabshakeh]

I'd seen reports yesterday but was too distracted by various life flare ups to post.

I loved his playing, although a lot of it is hard to access. 

The next two or three years are going to be hard. 

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, saw that as well -- too bad. But a full life! RIP.

[Justin V]

I only discovered Rosengren's music recently, enjoying Summit Meeting, a date that he co-led with Nisse Sandstrom.  I'll be checking out more of his work.  Thank you for the music, Mr. Rosengren, and rest in peace.

[soulpope]

R.I.P   ....

[Peter Friedman]

I have been a fan of Bernt Rosengren for many years. Very sorry to hear that he has died.