Christmas With My Friends V - Landgren, Nils
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line up
Nils Landgren / trombone & vocals
Sharon Dyall / vocals
Jonas Knutsson / saxophones
Jeanette Köhn / vocals
Eva Kruse / bass
Jessica Pilnäs / vocals
Ida Sand / vocals, piano & school organ
Johan Norberg / guitars & kantele
Fans of Nils Landgren will know him as Mr. Redhorn. This dare-devil Action Man drives his Funk Unit heroically from the front, sweat bejewelling his forehead. That, however is just one of the many sides of this popular and immensely likeable Swedish trombonist and bandleader. The master of the in-the-pocket groove also has a much softer, more romantic side. This sentimental mode found its most natural and effective method of expression in a thought he had exactly ten years ago. Landgren’s idea was not just a good one, it was a keeper: he would gather good friends around him, and they would celebrate Christmas together, through music.
So, in 2006, on went the red satin dinner jacket for the very first time, and “Christmas With My Friends” was born. The concert in the ancient Odensala Church in Stockholm was recorded, and then issued as a CD. It was to prove the beginning of an unprecedented success story. Every two years, Landgren took himself off on a Christmas season tour, alternating between Sweden and Germany. Four albums have chronicled this developing story, and each of them has in its turn been awarded with the German Jazz Award. Three of them have gone platinum, and the most recent (so far, watch this space...) is currently gold. The press and the public got right behind these albums from the start. The widely-read German current affairs magazine Stern garlanded “Christmas With My Friends” with the description of “the most beautiful of all the Christmas CDs of the year,” praising its “unique, bright, sparkling, festive atmosphere that goes straight to the heart." Stern was just as fulsome in its recommendation of the second album: “Our verdict is still the same. This one also glistens like a starry Nordic winter night sky.” The UK critic Dave Gelly writing in the Observer has praised the albums as follows: “There is an irresistible feeling of serenity and calm about the whole thing”...” “Landgren’s concept of a Christmas album is so much more sophisticated than the norm that it's the only possible choice for this season” …. “The secret lies in the combination of simple intimacy, polished musicianship and a programme full of subtly chosen surprises.” A visit in person to one of these concerts, often held in resonant churches, almost always completely sold out, gives a sense of the special mood they create: in the audiences are always radiant expressions from blissfully happy faces, and to judge by the expressions one sees, the concerts seem to answer a need, to be everything one could ever dream of, the very best way to get completely carried along by the Christmas spirit.