The theme Sigurd Hole raises with his work “Extinction Sounds” gives me a deeply wistful feeling. Hole asks himself whether he can hear the same sounds and smell the same smells at Gammelsetra in Rendalen today as he did when he was there as a child. The questions he asks himself and the wonder that comes with them have both micro and macro perspectives. Anyone who has lived a few decades will be able to recognize these thoughts and recall memories that reflect the same on a personal level. If you magnify Sigurd Hole's observations, environmental threats and the climate crisis flood in, along with heat records and the threat of extinction. Where I've been, we've lost the sounds of owls, terns and belching eels. The scent of the night violet still holds us up, but it has become fainter. Can I trust my own memory, Hole asks. Who knows!

When tonight's band comes on stage, bassist and composer Sigurd takes the floor and talks about the background to the work “Extinction Sounds”, which is also being released these days. It was commissioned by the TronTalks festival in 2023. Hole talks about art and emotions and shows a picture of Gammelsetra, where he went to compose tonight's music. He manages to create a warm setting and establish a sense of seriousness before a single note has been played. Then it's pianist Ayumi Tanaka who makes the sun rise over the ridge in the music, with shining chord treatment. It is she who wakes us up, and it is Hole's bow that draws the morning mood through the bass. The sound is low and rich, full of tiny twists and steps. Hole's story of his childhood life on the farm and his experiences of sound stay as a reminder throughout the evening's journey. Branches that move lightly and leaves that whisper. The awakening is beautiful, mysterious and alluring. The three strings ignite warm melodies and whine like torn stems. Cellist Tanja Orning, violist Bendik Bjørnstad Foss and violinist Sara Övinge play presence into the expression.

Torben Snekkestad's trumpet is dark and deep, and the small orchestra takes the sounds from the edge of the forest seriously. I can say that, because tonight's performance is a sound fantasy, and what we hear is as if it had been created to continue the story. It's crawling and creeping, and maybe the trumpet is calling the sheep now. Perhaps the log walls are creaking at us. It twitches and rolls, shears and squeaks. The insects come out of the soprano, and I don't know where the flies are coming from. Anders Kregnes Hansen's drums and percussion invite us into their own sound spaces, which are all part of Hole's well-balanced and propulsive work. I believe in what comes and stay in the yard. The patterns have a flattering unruliness about them. The music is beautiful and soothing, but doesn't shy away from offering resistance. Then there is wind in Snekkestad's sideways soprano and small flutters in Tanaka's piano. Whether it's night or day in the music is hard to say. I can choose for myself. When the musicians raise their voices, literally, there is a sense of wonder in the experience. Perhaps the exclamation is meant as a warning!

Sigurd Hole and his ensemble design something I can drift around in, get lost in, take in with pleasure and carry with me. The mournful melodies emphasizes the theme of the piece. The concert doesn´t feel long. When the septet stops playing, the musicians signal that it's not over, but it is. The sound from the ensemble does not return. It's a strong and effective strategy. I think Sigurd Hole succeeds well in this project. He creates beautiful and ambiguous music and awakens thoughts that need to stay awake. The bassist's story about Gammelsetra and our own thoughts about the loss of sound and new threats are woven together with the concert experience and given significance. Hole puts art in tension in the face of some of the disturbing issues of our time. He did it with great success in the work “Roraima”, and now he has done it again with “Extinction Sounds”, with an approach we may all relate to.

ARILD R. ANDERSEN

Like so many, the Norwegian bassist Sigurd Hole — a nimble-fingered player and a composer of sonically expansive, thoughtfully paced music — has been overcome with dismay at the fast-worsening climate crisis. Like too few, in the face of it he’s sought out wisdom and theory from non-industrialized societies. “The Presentation Dance” comes from his newest album, “Roraima,” which he made after reading “The Falling Sky,” a book by the Yanomami shaman and mouthpiece Davi Kopenawa. The rain-like pitter-patter of a marimba interacts with a small corps of strings, playing fluid and intertwined melodies that sometimes fall into a pizzicato repartee with the marimba’s mallets. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO

Norwegian bassist inspired by the sound of arctic nature

Avant-garde bassist Sigurd Hole recorded Lys/ Mørke on the island of Sørværet in the Norwegian arctic.

If it was recorded anywhere else, it would have sounded completely different, such is its connection to theground from which it grew. Using only his double bass, Hole has made improvised acoustic sound-art that is intimately inspired by the sounds, colours and landscape of Sørværet. By recording out in the open, the ambient sounds of birds, rain and wind in grass become integral to the music and meaning of the album.

Dividing the double album into light (Lys) and darkness (Mørke), Hole explores the ever-important themes of ecology and the philosophical unity of humanity and nature through the language of sound. He uses the whistling sounds of the bass’ harmonics to form mimesis and mimicry, stirring reminiscences of throat singing and Sámi joik alongside more traditional jazz and Scandinavian folk. The atmosphere here is sparse and calm, if occasionally unsettling in its vastness. Even moments of musical turmoil are appropriate and magical elements of the sonic ecosystem. The result is so personal and introspective as to feel perhaps a little intrusive, but it serves perfectly to allow our ears to visit the cold scenery of Sørværet and to hear Hole’s soul. JIM HICKSON

Sigurd Hole, an acclaimed accompanist for Tord Gustavsen and others, ventured to the Norwegian island Fleinvær to record his latest album. There, he tapped the area’s atmospheric inspirations, allowing ambient sounds to make cameo appearances on the solo bass recording, emphasizing the importance of nature and ecology in his conceptual mix.

An especially rich spectrum of harmonics, overtones, percussive effects and arco colorations make up the essential vocabulary on the contemplative double-disc Lys/Mørke, a follow-up to 2018’s solo Elvesang. But what pushes Hole’s bass work into the realm of the sublime are his refined sense of improvisation and painterly subtlety. From the Lys disc, a folkish pulse graces “Yngeldans,” while “Havsang” suggests a low, loamy elegy.

The Mørke disc opens with the timbral wash of arco sweeps on “Bølge” and closes with a resolving sigh of the introspective, melodic “Epilog.” In between come “Mørke,” with its pizzicato gravitas and the primal rhythmic vigor of “Refleksjon.” As an integrated whole, deserving a listen from beginning to end, the recording transports listeners to the realms of Norwegian wilderness and the wilderness of double bass, no additives necessary. JOSEF WOODARD