2010
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///// KONFRONTATIONEN NICKELSDORF 2010

15 - 18th JULY (4 days!) CURATED BY Mats Gustafsson & Hans Falb ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Parallel needs and deeds

I was 14 years old when I experienced the music of Peter Brötzmann, Sonny Rollins, Steve Lacy, Dror Feiler and Per Henrik Wallin for the first time. It changed my life. It changed my ways, my habits, my needs, and my deeds. I was just a football playing kid (and Little Richard fan) mistreating a distorted Fender Rhodes (and flute...) in various local punk and jazz-rock units in Umeå. This new overwhelming music changed my DNA...the transformation of energies and the sheer musical poetry, without words... without "songs"... it KILLED ME! Possibilities arised! I could suddenly see the connections between not only different kinds of creative music's, but also the why's and how's of literature, art, ideologies, politics and related matters. This music was and is the complete eye and ear opener!

In the very same year (!) the Nickelsdorf Konfrontationen started their activity in the village we know so well by now. The festival started with high ambitions of presenting creative music and this is still true. Never have I met such a dedicated, and at the same time very, very cool and relaxed man, as Hans Falb. The first meeting with Hans was amazing. I had very high expectations about the festival. And everything was true, just much, much more intense... I remembered Hans preparing me a HUGE beefsteak 4 o'clock in the morning after some very, very intense sets of music, accompanied by the usual great wines of Gerhard Luncer...
Since my first meeting (in 1995) with the Konfrontationen I have been in LOVE. And this is still true. Even more so now after meeting the LOVE of my life, even if she grew up 15 minutes away from The Jazzgalerie... Nickelsdorf is the one place where I have played the most in Europe and slept the least...

My own musical journey and the history of the festival have in a way been running parallel from the very start. Many musicians have we met and worked with. A Lot of wine and grappa has been drunken, great food has been eaten... and a SHITLOAD of great music have we heard!!!

For myself personally... it is all coming together this July!

Because of different reasons, I guess (...one could possibly be that I will get married in Nickelsdorf this July and move there in 2011)... I have been asked to curate this year's program together with Hans Falb. What a dream! What a challenge! This is the only logic. Nickelsdorf is one of the real epicenters of creative music in the world and everyone that has been at the Jazzgalerie 48 hours in a row or more, during a festival, understands why. There is usually no reason to check in at hotels and such... when everything is happening inside/ outside of the Jazzgalerie! Stay up and find out why! We all know why this place, this festival, these people working like maniacs are so special - THIS IS THE SHIT! This is what it is all about!!! Lets share it all together...

I m very, very happy to be able to share my experiences and share my network of contacts with musicians and artists in order to create a program together with Hans that hopefully in a way or two is connecting with the history of the Konfrontationen and also the future.

It's all about the FIRE!
It's all about DOING IT!


It's all about...
The needs
The deeds

It's all about sharing.

Musicians, audience and all related:

Free your mind and it will all follow... do it now! (WHAT TIME IS IT?)


Welcome - Willkommen - Välkommen -- to the FEST of the year!!!

Peace & FIRE / mats gustafsson
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