Johannes Landgren was born in Arjeplog. He received his musical education at the School of Music (now the Academy of Music and Drama) at the University of Gothenburg, where he graduated as an organist, choir teacher, certified organist and PhD. He has toured the world, from California in the west to Siberia in the east and has recorded over 35 CDs in a wide variety of genres. His concert activities include collaborations with Per Anders Nilsson, Håkan Lewin, Anders Hagberg, Daniel Berg, Helena Ek, Amanda Sedgwick and others. Landgren is a freelance musician and conductor. He has also served as professor and vice-dean at the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Gothenburg and, until this summer, as professor and acting rector at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm.  

Meditation for organ, saxophone and electronics – suite in seven parts. 

Concert | Mark Tatlow, Per-Anders Nilsson and Johannes Landgren  

The first pilgrim’s word of the festival, simplicity, is reflected in relief against Haydn’s music and leads to a nightly improvisation between Landgren’s organ and Nilsson’s saxophone and electronics, where we take part of a concert permeated by the pilgrim’s theme.  

Inspired by the seven key words of the pilgrimage, Johannes Landgren and Per Anders Nilsson have put together a suite of new, old and borrowed material especially for the Kalv Festival. The music has an ambient and minimalist character, where the listener can choose how to listen; to listen actively and / or let yourself be surrounded by the music and immerse yourself in your own thoughts. And maybe even doze off for a while. The key words of the pilgrim are embodied in seven different pieces / frameworks for improvisation with different characters. The meditation includes the following music: 

Simplicity: Fluctuations is an improvisation for organ and live electronics. The starting point is a floating tone in space, the tone A = 220Hz, a sine wave without harmonics, a kind of sounding elementary particle of which all sound is made, it could not be simpler.  

Freedom: Key Points. A pre-programmed electronic phrase constitutes a fixed point, a sounding anchor to improvise over with the rule of strictly adhering to the prescribed tonal repertoire. Freedom from freedom to choose. 

Silence: In a Silent Way by Joe Zawinul is a modern jazz standard from Miles Davis’ 1969 album of the same name.  

Carefree: All That is the Case by Nilsson is inspired by the first movement of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus: The world is all that is the case. 

Slowness: Improvised organ solo by Johannes Landgren. 

Spirituality: Send your light and your truth is a Gregorian hymn. 

Sharing: I’ve Seen by Lars Gullin is a jazz ballad from the 1964 album Portrait of my Pals. The piece is sometimes performed vocally with the following text from the Old Testament. 

Everything has its time, there is a time for everything under heaven: a time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to uproot, a time to slay, a time to heal, a time to tear down, a time to build up, a time to weep, a time to smile, a time to mourn, a time to dance, a time to cast stones, a time to gather stones, a time to embrace, a time to refrain from embracing, a time to gain, a time to lose, a time to save, a time to throw, a time to tear apart, a time to sew together, a time to keep silent, a time to speak, a time to love, a time to hate, a time for war, a time for peace. (ch 3, verses 1-8). 

Our hope is that the concert will invite a moment of contemplation, an opportunity to shut out the world and all that is in it, freedom from the freedom of having to do anything.