Songs from New York with Chase, Allegra and Simón

Imagine. A mysterious lady from a faraway Switzerland approaches you to suggest that all she wants is that you move to Basel for a year and play jazz. Day and night. 

She says you will have no practical worries. She promises to come and listen to you in between doing the dishes, as she has traded her family riches for modesty. 

Believe it or not, Chase Kuesel is a real life character in the story. A young composer from the American East Coast, he received – and took the offer, ending up jamming with musicians from around this planet day and night, in Basel, as agreed. What do you think he did next?

New York. 

He left the Swiss comfort to come back to New York, the discomforting. New York the disorienting. New York of intense energy, where jazz stars are born out of talent, unstoppable initiative and belief in yourself. New York, where once, as a kid, in a small jazz bar in Harlem he first heard jazz – a turning point for his life's dreams and passion.

https://youtu.be/hdVTNmCDhXE

Now settled in Brooklyn, he has invited Simón Willson’s double-bass and Allegra Krieger’s voice to join his drums for a live jam performance where the three will weave music inspired by Chase’s first published album – Space Between. 

The trio has chosen Pete’s Candy Store as a private room where we will meet this Sunday for the jazz stories that need to be told – and heard.