Brandon Lopez

Fourth episode of Talking & Improvising. This episode features conversations in words and music between the two bass players Jesper Nordberg and Brandon Lopez. The podcast was recorded in October 2024, with financial support from the Swedish Arts Council. 

Brandon Lopez is a New York-based Puerto Rican/American musician working at the fringes of jazz, free improvisation, noise an,d new music. His music has been praised as “brutal” (Chicago Reader) and “relentless” (The New York Times). 

He’s a frequent collaborator with the luminaries of NY’s avant-garde, including Fred Moten, John Zorn, Sun Ra Arkestra. His trio with Gerald Cleaver and Steve Baczkowski won Best Concert of the Year 2021 in the NYC Jazz Record for their performance at the prestigious Vision Festival. 

Jesper Nordberg is a young Swedish double bass player. He has studied at the famed Rhythmic Music Conservatory in Copenhagen. He has collaborated with numerous prominent European and American improvising musicians, including Okay Temiz, Zeena Parkins, Tomasz Dabrowski, Jesper Zeuthen, and Kasper Tranberg. With a grand tone and characteristic feel for rhythmical changes and displacements, he has established himself as an individual voice at the jazz scenes of Copenhagen and Malmö. He takesa big interest in folk music from the Balkans, and has collaborated with musicians from Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia, Turkey, and Romania.