the munderkingen sessions / part 2
kneer
van veenendaal
- 1 Oscar & Willi In Heaven (4:25)
- 2 Im Schilde (1:31)
- 3 Perfect Scetch (2:54)
- 4 My Friend The Rain (2:22)
- 5 Re-Start (2:11)
- 6 Anybody There? (3:30)
- 7 Reference 1 (1:34)
- 8 Night Scene (2:57)
- 9 Ant Race (3:19)
- 10 Merging Worlds (2:52)
- 11 Reference 2 (1:15)
- 12 Kondensationskern (4:35)
- 13 Reisetraum 1 (1:04)
- 14 Suspicious Meeting (4:25)
- 15 La Langue Universelle (2:41)
- 16 Reisetraum 2 (1:14)
- 17 Twenty Years Later (4:48)
Album Info
- meinrad kneer – double bass
- albert van veenendaal – (prepared) piano
Recorded by Albert van Veenendaal, february 16, 2024
at Secret House Studio, Amsterdam
Mixed and mastered by Alexis Baskind, Berlin
Piano technician André Oorebeek
All compositions by Kneer / van Veenendaal, ©Buma/Stemra
design: lysander le coultre (strangelove creatives)
photography: monique besten
distribution: www.subdist.com
evil rabbit records is a member of www.toondist.com
Reviews
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Eyal Hareuveni, 2 april 2025, percorsi musicali
German, Berlin-based double bass player-composer Meinead Kneer and Dutch, Amsterdam-based pianist-composer-arranger-producer Albert van Veenendaal have played together for almost 25 years and collaborated in many musical endeavors. They founded the Evil Rabbit label, dedicated to contemporary improvised music rooted in the European culture, and collaborated in many projects, including the quintet President of the Globe, the trio Spoon 3, another trio with drummer Yunga Sun, and duo albums.
Kneer, who runs today alone the Evil Rabbit label, operates on the borders of modern jazz, free improvised, ethnic, and contemporary music. Van Veenendaal works with many national and international jazz, world, and classical musicians throughout Europe, and is considered a master of the prepared piano. He runs the Minimal Damage label, dedicated for adventurous music that doesn’t fit regular categories.
The Munderkingen Sessions, Part 1 was recorded at Kneer’s hometown, Munderkingen, in Germany during a three-day session in September 2024 (Evil Rabbit, 2007). The follow-up, Part 2, was recorded almost twenty years later at van Veenendaal’s ‘Secret House Studio’ in Amsterdam in a one-day session in February 2024.
Part 2 offers 17 short pieces that capture the intimate and introspective, exploratory, and genre-defying aesthetics of Kneer and van Veenendaal, “La Langue Universelle” as one of the pieces is aptly titled. These spontaneous and unhurried improvisations suggest instant, irreverent compositions that flow naturally, rely on profound rapport and an almost telepathic interplay, expand the sonic palette of the double bass and the piano with extended bowing techniques and distinct preparations, and never settle on familiar courses. Just two long-time friends, who are masters of their instruments and the art of the moment, enjoy deep, playful, and nuanced conversations and are not shy from occasional bold and even some noisy disagreements. Sometimes it is more than enough.