Boi Akih In Quartet With Duo Baars Henneman at Festival Trytone 20 at Splendor

Boi Akih and Duo Baars Henneman’s first encounter on stage was magical. It was immediately clear that there should be a follow up. That’s why singer Monica Akihary and guitarist Niels Brouwer invited woodwind player Ab Baars and violist Ig Henneman to perform with them as a quartet at the Try Tone Festival.

Although both duos have different backgrounds, their music is based on the same principles: establishing something out of nothing or almost nothing, creating on the spot, and during this process trying to understand one’s fellow musician, supporting him or her, and where necessary contradicting. A fundamental principle is the shaping of the music together, while maintaining one’s own individual improvisational language. Its character, texture and sound. The instrumentation of voice, clarinet/shakuhachi/tenor saxophone, guitar and viola is an ideal medium for this....

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Boi Akih and Duo Baars Henneman’s first encounter on stage was magical. It was immediately clear that there should be a follow up. That’s why singer Monica Akihary and guitarist Niels Brouwer invited woodwind player Ab Baars and violist Ig Henneman to perform with them as a quartet at the Try Tone Festival.

Although both duos have different backgrounds, their music is based on the same principles: establishing something out of nothing or almost nothing, creating on the spot, and during this process trying to understand one’s fellow musician, supporting him or her, and where necessary contradicting. A fundamental principle is the shaping of the music together, while maintaining one’s own individual improvisational language. Its character, texture and sound. The instrumentation of voice, clarinet/shakuhachi/tenor saxophone, guitar and viola is an ideal medium for this.

Monica Akihary voice, electronics
Ab Baars tenor saxophone, clarinets, shakuhachi
Niels Brouwer guitars
Ig Henneman viola


“It was all captivating, each minimalistic expression by either guitar or voice, every sound variation in Akihary's great vocal vocabulary, each crisp or subtle phrase on Brouwers guitar, every powerful discharge from this perfectly attuned duo ..". Jazznytt by Bjarne Soeløft

" The show was an intimate look at two distinct, creative voices in the Dutch scene. Sometimes it was frighteningly harsh, as when Baars chose to camp out in the highest register. Other times, it was stark and disarmingly beautiful, with a lyrical saxophone exchanging lines with a sensitive viola.” --Adam Kinner The Montreal Gazette

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