Bode Wilson "Aether"

A search engine will tell you that Bode Wilson is a young American student and wrestler, with broad shoulders and a sturdy neck.

Oh, actually not, the first hit was incorrect. Or maybe not after all, because the Portuguese Bode Wilson, which will close Tampere Jazz Happening on Sunday evening at Telakka, also wrestles – with jazz, improvised jazz to be more specific.

But this particular Bode Wilson is just fiction, a band of three experienced jazz musicians. The saxophonist-flautist João Pedro Brandão (born in 1977), bassist Demian Cabaud (born in 1977) and drummer Marcos Cavaleiro (born in 1980) point out that they play their liberating jazz primarily as a collective, as one man. “Our music is based on friendship, respect and listening, dialogue, conversation and debate.”

So far Bode Wilson has released three albums, the first one in 2014 and the latest, Aether, in 2022. It was recorded under the open sky in the ruins of an old Portuguese chapel surrounded by stone walls. The idea was that this environment would become part of the music, part of Bode Wilson’s improvisations. What will happen at Telakka, the band surrounded by its historical walls of red bricks? The ceiling is pretty low, but maybe you can refer to it as some kind of local chapel of live music.