Kathmandu:

“Jazz is the music of the body.”

Thus said Anais Nin, a French-born American author.

And so it might be.

With jazz you sway your body and you tap your feet in sync with whatever music that’s being played.

And it’s time yet again for a festival that celebrates this music of the body — the Surya Classic Jazzmanu 2006 that is scheduled to kick off on October 11 with Upstairs Jam. The festival will bring together musicians from Canada, France, Norway, the US, Germany, Israel Spain, Venezuela, Australia and, of course, Nepal.

Jazzmandu is an idea born of young minds in Nepal that aims at bringing together the powers of jazz music from all over the world to the Himalayas and spread the message of peace.

Apart from the ticketed shows, there will be a Free Jazz show at Basantapur Durbar Square, while Jazz for Students and Jazz Movies are also planned, not to forget the Jazzmandu Peace Parade including international musicians, Nepali musicians and traditional dancers, Buddhist monks, and vintage bikes and cars.

With Jazzmandu turning out to be a truly international event, a number of foreign musicians will be performing. Let’s get to know them a little better and what their music is all about.

Remi Abram Quartet

The Remi Abram Quartet was founded in 2000, and they are Remi Abram — tenor and soprano saxophone, Claudio Celada — piano, Philipppe Guiraud — bass, and Ulrich Edorh — drums.

They have since performed in Europe and the Caribbeans and have come out with two CDs. Their music is a mixture of be-bop and hard-bop, strongly influenced by Caribbean Jazz.

Each musician is involved in various other musical projects. For instance, Remi and Ulrich (drummer) form part of an Electro-Jazz band with released albums. Pianist Claudio also plays bossanova and salsa and has toured Europe, the Caribbeans and Central America. Philippe, who plays the bass in Remi’s Quartet, has also performed in various parts of the world.

Remi has solo projects that have taken him often to New York, the French Caribbean (where he is originally from) and to South Korea.

Andy Grosskopf

Saxophonist, flutist and composer Andy Grosskopf was born on December 25, 1972 in southern Germany. After attending the Academy of Contemporary Music in Zurich, he moved to Leipzig in 1995 where he lives.

This is where he earned recognition with three other projects Ag Trio (mainstream-jazz), Scrooge (jazz-rock) and MSP (drum’nbass / ambient). With MSP, he won the ‘Leipzig Jazz Award’ in 1999.

The German Goethe-Institut invited Grosskopf’s band Scrooge to play in Paris in January, 1997. The following year, the same band was invited to play the ‘European Jazzfestival’ in Poitiers, France.

In the fall of 2000 Grosskopf released the CD Scrooge with Scrooge. Two years later he won the ‘Art Award of the City of Friedrichshafen 2002’.

Grosskopf works with percussionist Hakim Ludin and DJ Raphneck under the name Trance.ition, which mixes dance grooves with spherical melodies, jazz and funk are transcended by oriental rhythms and soundscapes.

The saxophone-player works on solo-concerts where he doesn’t play with other musicians but with a diversity of electronic effects, whereas no pre-produced samples are used, but everything one hears is being produced live on stage.

Grosskopf’s latest project is called Nyle working on some dance-funk-jazz with New York-based singer Milesz alias Miles Griffith.