Jazz em Agosto, 42nd edition 2026 (Part 1)

By David Cristol

Jazz em Agosto took place over ten days in the heart of the summer, with a bold programming that has become the norm for the manifestation. Stellar line-ups and excellent listening conditions make the festival a favorite of audiences, artists and critics. With 14 concerts and the aim of "presenting the current creative and original state of jazz" according to artistic director Rui Neves, this year's edition was another winner. 

 

Joachim Kühn. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

The opening act was set in the big auditorium of the Gulbenkian Foundation. The supreme venue, which stage stands in front of large glass walls overlooking the Foundation's gardens with wildlife, previously welcomed ensembles by Nicole Mitchell, Nate Wooley, XT, as well as the Sylvie Courvoisier/Cory Smythe duo, and Shane Parish solo. The striking architecture gives an extra layer of grandeur to a rare solo performance by pianist Joachim Kühn, who was involved in all the developments of jazz since the 1960s. It's a celebration of the piano. He kicks things off with a 40-minute abstract improvisation. His stream-of-consciousness extemporizations initially owe more to classical music motions and impulses than to the jazz vocabulary, but prove terrific all the same, as his cavalcades of notes take the audience on a spontaneous and heartfelt journey, not relying on any trusted tricks or routines. What follows increasingly leans into free jazz territory. Kühn doesn't need a formal structure to let his ideas flow. Clear-cut melodies are eschewed in favor of waves and cells, forays into microscopic ruminations, dark lullabies and brooding ad-libs, slowly but surely leading to epic flights. The music shape-shifts, and goes in virtually any direction. No high concept, no extramusical discourse and no filler. It seems as if the fingers have a mind of their own, without ideas being filtered by the brain. As a double encore, we get two songs by Ornette Coleman : "Somewhere" and "Researching has no limits"- that title pretty well summing up the performance.

David Maranha and Rodrigo Amado. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

Day two starts with a duo of Lisbon-based artists, David Maranha and Rodrigo Amado. They join forces in the great-sounding auditorium 2, the indoors venue where the more experimental gigs take place in the late afternoons. Theirs is not a first encounter but a continued exploration, as evidenced on 2024's Wrecks and 2026's Desolation Row albums, both recommended to readers of this blog and with liner notes by master Stuart Broomer accompanying the newest title. An interesting tension arises from the association of Amado's jazz vocabulary and Maranha's electric organ and effects that build modal soundscapes and ambient layers for the tenor saxophonist to improvise, spout swirling motifs, throw raucous darts, focus on one repeated note or long-held growls, investigating the whole instrument's range in the spirit of freedom he's accustomed listeners to. Although the uninterrupted set doesn't seem to have a beginning, end or arc, it sustains interest throughout and is met with a standing ovation. 

Canyon. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

Another bona fide improvised set follows on the outdoors stage. A particularly exciting one for this listener, who sees Joe Morris live for the first time, after having enjoyed his recordings, on both bass and guitar, alongside well-known players as well as young talent, for a couple decades. It's Canyon's second gig only. The New York quartet, made up of Jerome Deupree (drums, of 1990s band Morphine and a colleague of Morris since 1985), Sylvie Courvoisier (prepared and unprepared piano), Lester St. Louis (cello) and Morris (double bass), have a self-titled double CD out on Fundacja Słuchaj. Morris was the honoree at this year's Vision Festival in June of this year. Total improv is always a risky endeavour, a collective walk on a tightrope. Courvoisier and St. Louis are extrovert players, the former digging into her repository of techniques and signature moves (percussive clangs, swarms of notes, playing on the strings to get a harpsichord-like sound...), the latter supplying creaks at breaking point and harmonics-filled glissandi, while the bass and drums pair maintain a collected, counter-spectacular bearing, Deupree a paragon of restraint on his instrument and Morris quietly connecting the dots and steering the ship. The initial scattering gradually gives way to keen mutual listening from band members, intent on making each other sound good without relinquishing their distinct temperaments. Once balance is found, there is nowhere the quartet can't go, with seamless transitions from busy waves to sparse lulls, impressionnistic sequences to rhythmical ones. A piano-less trio segment also engagingly reshuffles the deck for a while.

Shardik. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

A John Zorn-produced venture, Shardik is the brainchild of guitarist/composer Matt Hollenberg (Simulacrum), and brings a punk-funk spin on the metal-jazz genre, boasting bands such as Kilter and Imperial Triumphant and of which an early incarnation were Secret Chiefs 3, of which Hollenberg is now a member. Bubbly bass, heavy riffs, more bounce than your average kangaroo tribe, and themes that owe something to Zorn's Bagatelles, Masada and Dreamers songbooks. Not surprising considering how closely Hollenberg is involved with Manhattan's main magus - most currently with the Flatlands trio. Another obvious influence is that of the Mahavishnu Ochestra. Around Hollenberg are Sana Nagano on oddly-shaped electric violin, Nick Jost on electric bass and Danny Sher on drums. At times the music gels into delicious psychedelic concoctions - only for short spells though, for the imported, competitive New York ethos means hitting hard and running to the next phase without delay. However, the outdoors setting gives the whole thing a different perspective than the same music played in a Brooklyn club; Hollenberg savours the configuration where audience and band are united as in a ritual. Indeed this is no place for superficial consumerism, and the music is lent a sacred function with attendees ready to be moved, elevated, maybe changed. The song-length tunes are tightly organized, with sharp turns and millimetric cues. An athletic feat for the performers, with plenty of challenges to tackle. Not revolutionary maybe, but damn enjoyable, with the egoless relationship between members also working in the music's favor. The full Cruelty Bacchanal album is played, plus tunes from the previous album and an improvisation as the last number. Hollenberg is surprised at the request for an encore, New York audiences seemingly having enough after shorter sets! 

Fred Moten & Brandon Lopez. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

Next up is the politically aware duo of thinker and poet Fred Moten and bassist Brandon Lopez. Double bass with poetry reading is a rare sight, at least for European audiences, but it belongs to an age-old US tradition going back to Lenny Bruce, Jack Kerouac and the Beat poets encounters with jazzmen, from the 1940s onwards. The fact that Sonny Stitt and Zoot Sims are namechecked reinforces that connection. After all, jazz and poetry are a meaningful combination of two rebellious, social-conscious artforms. A pair of bongos stands between both artists and they caress it with the palm of the hand or give it finger taps, while also coaxing sounds from the double bass, humming along in the case of Lopez and triggering foley sounds and jazz samples from a laptop, as sound signifiers, for Moten. The lyrics are laden with references to jazzmen and jazz tunes as well as early hip-hop wordsmiths. The delivery is low-key, poised, with a slightly ironical distance. The bass adapts to the mood and rhythm of the words, and provides punctuation. The abstruse or metaphorical character of the texts makes it difficult to fully grasp their meaning in one listen. But they also work as purely sonic elements, reaching ears and minds. In addition to playing the bass in orthodox fashion, Lopez generates murmurs by polishing the wood of its body. A fearless programming choice typical of Jazz em Agosto and one of this edition's best. 

L.U.M.E. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

L.U.M.E. aka Lisbon Underground Music Ensemble is a well-oiled machine which 20th-year celebration offers a pot-pourri of the Ensemble's history, without a perceivable unifying theme or statement of intent. It encompasses everything from early jazz to 1970s jazz-rock, disco and Steve Reich repetition, the whole thing as remote from 2026 trends as it gets, and heedless to the world's turmoil. Fine soloists bring the colorful, light-hearted, sometimes openly comedic arrangements to life, with leader/composer/pianist/keyboardist Marco Barroso conducting improvised ensemble passages with a sure hand.

Bonbon Flamme. Photo by Petra Cvelbar - Gulbenkian Música

In the Fifties and Sixties, Dave Brubeck came back from world tours with a series of "Impressions" albums - from the U.S.A., New York, Japan and Eurasia. Likewise, French cellist Valentin Ceccaldi came back from a trip to Mexico with flavors, tones and textures in mind, which inspired him to found the quartet Bonbon Flamme with a team of like-minded players to serve his polychromatic purpose. What we get amounts to a European version of Tropicalia, with the help of Lisbon guitar-hero Luis Lopes, free agent keyboardist Fulco Ottervanger and jittery drummer Etienne Ziemniak. Ceccaldi also admits to a passion for Alan Shorter's Orgasm, which might give another clue as to the unlabelable hodgepodge unveiled. Feathery downtempo numbers and ecstatic rock workouts share an intoxicating psychedelic bent, that makes use of simple riffs, crackling synthesizer sounds, twangy effects, disorienting arrangements with initial structural landmarks blurring and disappearing into floriferous freeform jams. Solos are short and enmeshed in the compositions. A hypnotizing voyage, with an immaculate first half-hour, and final song "Tres Calaveras" a climax - a pensive guitar-cello vehicle, with Ottervanger's high-pitched, wordless vocals turning it into a musical cousin of Hermeto Pascoal's moody "Little Church". The charged, raspy rock forays, hallucinogenic abstractions as well as the infinitely tender pieces are nothing short of greatness. However, the spell is temporarily endangered by a couple tongue-in-cheek pieces, with cutesy synth sounds and attempts at cartoonish humor. This caveat notwithstanding, a brilliant set.