THIS PAGE CONTAINS RECORDINGS, VIDEOS AND OTHER INFO ABOUT MY
SOLO ACTIVITIES FROM THE BEGINNING IN 2007 UP UNTIL …
HENRIK MUNKEBY NØRSTEBØ
ACOUSTIC AND AMPLIFIED TROMBONE
ONGOING PROCESS SINCE 2007
RELEASES:
FAINT LIGHT BLACKENS (PSYCHIC LIBERATION, 2026)
DYSTOPIAN DANCING (MADE NOW MUSIC, 2022)
MELTING INTO FOREGROUND (SOFA, 2015)
SOLO (CREATIVE SOURCES, 2011)
( still adding stuff here occasionally, so it doesn’t actually go back to “the beginning” quite yet… )
Previous solo performances:
25.04.26 – Punctum (Prague/CZ)
24.04.26 – Uczulenie (Wroclaw/PL)
11.04.26 – Konsertserien Periferien / Vigelandsmausoleet (Oslo/NO)
06.04.26 – Troika (Ghent/BE)
05.04.26 – Worm (Rotterdam/NL)
13.02.26 – Twenty Alpha (Hong Kong/HK)
17.11.25 – Larry’s corner (Stockholm/SE)
16.11.25 – Annan musik festival (Norrköping/SE)
01.05.25 – Brigade/Ssensorial (Mexico City/MX)
14.01.25 – Ny musikk Trondheim (Trondheim/NO)
02.12.24 – Morphine raum (Berlin/DE)
27.11.24 – Apparat/Km28 (Berlin/DE)
16.11.24 – Eilertsen & Granados teater (Stamsund/NO)
14.11.24 – Ny musikk Bodø (Bodø/NO)
05.11.24 – Levande musik (Gothenburg/SE)
11.10.23 – Emanuel Vigeland museum (Oslo/NO)
11.10.23 – Emanuel Vigeland museum (Oslo/NO)
27.04.23 – Eastern ear/The shoe factory (Norwich/UK)
26.04.23 – Lost property (Brighton/UK)
25.04.23 – Iklectik (London/UK)
24.04.23 – Plugd records (Cork/IR)
23.04.23 – Unit 44 (Dublin/IR)
22.04.23 – NAWR (Hay-on-Wye/UK)
21.04.23 – Rammel club (Nottingham/UK)
20.04.23 – The Lubber fiend (Newcastle/UK)
19.04.23 – Wharf Chambers (Leeds/UK)
15.04.23 – Eroteme (Manchester/UK)
14.04.23 – Giant tank (Edinburgh/UK)
13.04.23 – Sound thought (Glasgow/UK)
17.03.23 – Echoraum (Vienna/AT)
16.03.23 – Interpenetration (Graz/AT)
01.10.22 – Improverk (Oslo/NO)
25.05.22 –Shift/411 Kent (Greenpoint NYC)
23.09.21 – Morphine raum (Berlin/DE)
02.09.21 – Sowieso (Berlin/DE)
26.09.20 – Emanuel Vigeland Mausoleum (Oslo/NO)
21.02.20 – Estuary 2.0 / Tempe Atelier (Trondheim/NO)
15.04.19 – KM28 (Berlin/DE)
23.02.19 – Improverk (Oslo/NO)
16.02.18 – EMP collective (Baltimore MD/USA)
15.02.18 – The Apohadion theater (Portland ME/USA)
13.02.18 – Music under the moon (Worcester MA/USA)
11.02.18 – Never ending books (New haven CT/USA)
10.02.18 – Washington street arts center (Sommerville MA/USA)
09.02.18 – Jane doe (Greenfield MA/USA)
08.02.18 – 118 Elliot (Brattleboro VT/USA)
07.02.18 – happylucky nr. 1 (Brooklyn, NY/USA)
06.02.18 – Sediment arts (Richmond, VA/USA)
05.02.18 – Telemetry (Charlottesville, VA/USA)
04.02.18 – Rhizome (Washington D.C./USA)
13.12.17 – West Germany (Berlin/DE)
23.11.17 – Kristiansand kunsthall (Kristiansand/NO)
19.08.17 – Frantasia festival (Livermore falls, me/US)
08.03.17 – Goethebunker (Essen/DE)
07.03.17 – Ort (Wuppertal/DE)
06.03.17 – Kreuzung an Sankt Helena (Bonn/DE)
05.03.17 – Black box im Cuba (Münster/DE)
04.03.17 – Kunstmuseum (Bochum/DE)
03.03.17 – VHS (Duisburg/DE)
02.03.17 – Bergerkirche (Düsseldorf/DE)
01.03.17 – Loft (Cologne/DE)
19.08.16 – Frantasia festival (Livermore Falls, me/US)
30.04.16 – Mære kyrkje (Sparbu/NO)
29.04.16 – Leira kapell (Trondheim/NO)
28.04.16 – Stjørdal kirke (Stjørdal/NO)
27.04.16 – Sakshaug kirke (Inderøy/NO)
21.02.16 – Vår Frue kirke (Trondheim/NO)
12.02.16 – Parliament on King (Sydney/AU)
01.01.16 – Sydney improvised music association (Sydney/AU)
30.01.16 – SoundOut festival (Canberra/AU)
15.01.16 – Alte schmiede (Vienna/AT)
05.12.15 – Mozg (Warsaw/PL)
04.12.15 – Mozg (Bydgoszcz/PL)
03.12.15 – Centrum Amarant (Poznan/PL)
02.12.15 – Rozkurz (Wroclaw/PL)
21.11.15 – Festival Akouphene (Geneva/CH)
20.11.15 – Atelierkonzerte (Basel/CH)
08.11.15 – Kampenjazz (Oslo/NO)
08.05.15 – Levande musik (Gothenburg/SE)
28.04.15 – Pizdets (Oslo/NO)
20.02.15 – Capella Johannea (Oslo/NO)
21.11.14 – Concert series “MA” (Oslo/NO)
18.10.14 – Trondheim kunstmuseum (Trondheim/NO)
08.10.14 – Spillerom 18 (Oslo/NO)
20.06.14 – Progkunstfestivalen (Oslo/NO)
05.06.14 – Capella Johannea (Oslo/NO)
01.10.13 – Musikkbaren (Oslo/NO)
11.05.13 – Blæst (Trondheim/NO)
23.10.12 – Meta.Morph biennale (Trondheim/NO)
28.09.12 – Artisten (Gothenburg/SE)
27.09.12 – Ila fysikalske (Oslo/NO)
26.09.12 – Trondheim kunstmuseum (Trondheim/NO)
25.09.12 – Nils Aas kunstverksted (Inderøy/NO)
24.09.12 – Kulturbruket (Ørland/NO)
03.09.12 – Labor sonor (Berlin/DE)
26.05.12 – TS12/Babel (Trondheim/NO)
20.04.12 – Ni muser (Trondheim/NO)
25.01.12 – Nattergalen (Trondheim/NO)
09.08.11 – Gutvik ukentlig (Oslo/NO)
05.07.11 – Mitt andra hem (Gothenburg/SE)
19.06.11 – Kollektiv Akt/Moë (Vienna/AT)
12.06.11 – Rathaus (Bad Oldesloe/DE)
03.06.11 – Witzli Poetzli (Antwerp/BE)
03.05.11 – Hasselblad center (Gothenburg/SE)
15.04.11 – HSM (Gothenburg/SE)
19.03.11 – IBA col·lectiu d’improvisació (Barcelona/ES)
20.12.10 – Levinsalen, NMH (Oslo/NO)
21.11.10 – Café Under konstruktion (Copenhagen/DK)
06.11.10 – Kafé Klavér (Stockholm/SE)
10.10.10 – Konstmuseet (Gothenburg/SE)
02.06.10 – Hasselblad center (Gothenburg/SE)
06.08.09 – Teaterfabrikken (Ålesund/NO)
25.11.08 – HSM (Gothenburg/SE)
Excerpt from concert at Morphine raum
Berlin DE, Sep 2021
DYSTOPIAN DANCING - FOR AMPLIFIED TROMBONE & OBJECT ORCHESTRA (2022)
is Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø’s third solo release (following “SOLO” from 2011 and “Melting into foreground” from 2015), and his first based on amplified trombone. In the unadulterated “First move”, Nørstebø is utilizing an air compressor-like use of lungs, nuanced microphone technique and gain adjustments in order to unearth the intense physicality of the inherent low volume sound material. Trombone mutes and a plastic reed was used while playing, but the material is otherwise untreated.
“Second move” is a mirroring of that very same solo piece, where a varied range of sound sources (all played/activated by Nørstebø) have been arranged to follow the original piece closely while also opening gateways to alternative interpretations seemingly far from the source.
“First move” and chunks of “Second move” were recorded in November 2019 in an old school house turned sound studio in the Norwegian countryside. Certain additional trombone tracks were recorded in Oslo’s intensely reverberant “Emanuel Vigeland mausoleum”, while the rest of the sound sources were recorded progressively as compositional editing and production was done gradually over 2020 and 21.
The accompanying 20 page offset printed booklet contains images taken by Nørstebø during the same period, and can be seen as additional gateways to memory and interpretation, though not in any way intended as a definitive visualization of the music itself.
SOLO NORWICH (2023)
Live (documentation) recording from The Shoe Factory, Norwich UK, April 27th 2023.
This concert was the grand finale of a thirteen date solo tour in the UK and Ireland in April 2023. Spanning a wide range of spaces and situations, and including tons of train rides and delays, it totally lived up to be the boot camp tour I had wanted for developing my solo setup further!
As part of Raed Yassin’s “Phantom orchestra”
"Melting into foreground" (2015)
On both pieces, Nørstebø keeps his compositional structures clear through a balanced use of filled and empty space. The silences he allows between passages of sound tend to act as boundaries separating sections into disjunctive events defined by dramatic changes in timbre as well as in organization and dynamics. And despite his deliberate distorting and dismantling of the trombone’s conventional voice, he allows a fundamental warmth to pervade both performances.
Avant music news, Daniel Barbiero (USA)
He plays with focused control and measured reserve and shows a wise sense of using the resonant acoustics of the Capella Johannea in the Majorstuen church in Oslo, where this album was recorded. Nørstebø manages to transform the trombone in this piece into a unique sound generator, in a similar manner to the most experimental playing of British sax player John Butcher. All while balancing between intuitive following of the fleeting sounds and a linear construction of this piece.
Free jazz blog, Eyal Hareuveni
- Written about "SOLO" (2011)
Tio soloimprovisationer med fett sound och stor teknik kopplar upp oss med den gamla fina trombonskolan, där läpparna talar och en lur är en lur. Det är både svettigt och vackert.
Soundofmusic, Thomas Millroth (Sweden)
(…) this release by the young Norwegian improvisational trombonist Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø, an up-and-coming star of the scene in my opinion, goes beyond any dictates coming from musical trends, marketing pithy sayings or even social prejudices as some listeners joke on trombone considering it a musical instrument for beggars.
Chain D.L.K., Vito Camarretta (USA)
More so than most brass instruments, the trombone has the structure to be used as a solo instrument, yet, as these choice examples of contemporary Europe an solo trombone discs make obvious, careful planning as well as limitless chops is needed to make things work.
(…) the exposition is dedicated to fully formed vibrations resulting from a blustery chromatic tone and tongue stops. Utilizing extended brass techniques ranging from wide-bore blowing to expansive throat tightening, Nørstebø produces any manner of textures from his horn.
The New york city jazz record (USA)
(…) as if music for solo trombone was the most most common and popular thing in the world. The album as a whole is simply a full-blooded testimony of a very promising musician and one of the brightest indications that the Norwegian avant-garde scene isn’t leaving it’s internationally dominant place.
His voice magazine, Jan Faix (Czech republic)
REVIEWS