The Swedish Trombonist Who Went Out In the Cold
Noticed an insane-coded thing last week, and it's that there’s a slightly, yet very obviously worn bit on the carpet just beneath my desk at home.
It’s right in the exact spot where I put the ball of my left foot when I’m sitting down in my chair. I even did a whole performance for an audience of none after first catching it, getting up and down in my seat just to make sure it’s where my left foot actually goes. And, yes, there it is: a little too close to the edge of the carpet, a slight 45-degree angle, and just above some weird, raised stitching on the rug that’s really irritating on bare feet.
I reckon it’s because I often, as in, like, five out of every six working days, for instance, bounce my left foot up and down there incessantly. The bouncing, or tapping, or whatever tends to coordinate with whatever music I’m listening to that day. And seeing as I also tend to have some pretty exact conditions necessary for me to do some work, such as always needing to have a small hot drink next to a big, cold glass of water, my pens in the exact right place and have them within easy reach, and having to have read a good book or web article at least some time in the last 36 hours, my listening habits follows pattern too. So, there are “tapping days” and “not tapping days.”
For example, Mondays are all about setting intentions and prepping for the week, so that’s podcasts and then talk radio and ceaseless tapping. Then I think we all agree the most we’ve spiritually felt connected to the discernible idea of "Party Time” is at 3:30 PM on Friday, so music always switches from a sort of morning punk and psychedelic rock mix straight to some French, Italian House, or something that’s just called “Shibuya-Kei Mix.” So, there’s lots of tapping then to keep up with the beat and get into things, of course. You’re starting to get the picture now, I’m sure. So, just know that on Tuesday, I always just click on a Spotify playlist simply titled “Floaty.” I custom-made it, and it’s about 500+ songs from bands like Air, St Germain, and Stereolab, and it’s all quite ethereal, melodic, and transfixing. I never bounce my leg to it. Tuesday tends to be the day I get the most work done.
One artist who’s burrowed their way into the regular “Floaty” shuffle is Ebba Åsman, a Swedish trombonist who recently sent herself into self-exile in the red of winter to a remote cabin 200 miles west of Stockholm with no TV, social media, and email, fully logging off until she had a new album. We'll get to all that, though. For now, note that she’s not only very enjoyable to listen to but also created the sort of music that makes you want to sort yourself out and get things done.
Before the jazz composer, songwriter, and producer went out in the minus-thirty degree Swedish winter to a house that’s primary source of warmth involved an axe and wood, Ebba was enjoying life a comfortable, accomplished musician. The 26-year-old was just coming off a Swedish Grammy nomination for her sophomore album, Be Free, a smoky, 10-track cocktail of alternative jazz, ambient, and electronic.
Prior to that, Ebba won a scholarship at just 15 to attend the Södra Latin school in Stockholm. A hot-house for Swedish creative talent, Södra's alumni include singers like Lykke Li and rapper Yung Lean. She moved to the Netherlands soon after, however, studying at the Rotterdam Conservatory of Music. But the constraints of formal learning were pushing against her. So, back in Sweden, she set to work on new material and was invited to play at the Jazz Baltica festival by Nils Landgren, a fellow Swede and one of the world’s leading trombonists.
But, a new album called, and Ebba wanted to be in her own thoughts for its creation, which is what sent her to the cold, stillness, and solitude of the wilderness. Embracing both the deep sense of calm and the challenges, Ebba created When You Know, arriving March 21st. Here’s what she has to say about everything that went into it:
What's up, Ebba! Where are we talking to you from right now?
I'm good! And I'm in Stockholm.
So you're back home now?
I am. It's so dark, like it's six PM and it’s just black. I can’t wait for Spring. That’s when it’s really, really lovely.
Let’s see, where should we start here? Would you mind just sharing with everyone a little background, bio, how you got into playing and getting into music and specifically the trombone and all that other fun stuff?
(Laughs) I’ll try to do my best to recap, but yeah, my name is Ebba and I was born in a small town and I felt that I really wanted to play an instrument but I didn’t have musical parents or anything like that. I just felt that I wanted to play something, and I was quite weird. I always wanted to dress however I wanted, even though I was living in a small town where everyone dresses the same, and I wanted to play something that no one played. So, first I was in line for drums, but the teaching queue was very long, so I was, like, “Nah!” And there was no one playing the trombone, so then I wanted to play it. Like, on my first lesson for the sound it was like, “Okay, maybe this can be my thing?”
And I think it was also that I wanted something to identify with, and it just became a part of me pretty quickly. Yeah, I got obsessed with it. I wrote dreams and drew trombones on every school book and everywhere, and since then it has been my dearest friend, in a way. It's been there my whole life. So then, I felt that I wanted to move to Stockholm because of high school. They have a really good music high school in Stockholm called Södra, and it was pretty pretentious but a very good school. A lot of legends have come out of there.
I mean, I have a highlight in my notes here that says Young Lean graduated from there, is that right? It seems like quite a fascinating setup.
And Lykke Li. But, yes, so I was there and moved to Stockholm and really studied hard at it a lot. I would say that it was not the best years of my life. You know, I really, really practised. So, they were important years, somehow. But I wanted to go to a jazz conservatory after, and I ended up in Rotterdam.
I’ve always been a little bit of a nerd, so I knew what I had to practise, but there was a lot of theory and mechanics and mathematics to learn, like how the legends did it. But they just made it into a mechanical thing. After two and a half years, I didn’t really like that view of jazz.
It was too calculated and very, “These are the rules, and you cannot go outside these rules.” So, I got a little tired of that, and then I quit and ended up really trying to connect with what I like, because I’d been told so long what to listen to and what to play and what to practise and it was a very important time. I really dove into what I liked and how I wanted to play and how I wanted to approach things. I ended up writing an album, it’s called Be Free, which was a liberation from all the rules. Then, after that, I felt relieved and quite respected now compared to when I was following those rules. So, I feel quite free with what I want to do, and I wrote this album that is going to be released soon.
And, for me, I’ve always listened to all kinds of music. Like, I’ve been into and have always been into jazz for a long time, but now I’ve been embracing everything that I like and different influences. These are things that have affected me for a long time, but now it’s something that I really feel connected to.
It’s coming from a more personal space, it sounds like. What were some of your primary influences outside of class in school or with this new album? Was there anyone or style in particular you found yourself gravitating toward or inspired by?
Since my parents were not into jazz and never listened to it at home, it was a lot of untouched ground for me. When I started playing, I had an idol, Nils Landgren, a Swedish trombone player with a big red horn, and he’s super funky and cool. But he actually became my mentor, so it’s really cute.
How did you two initially meet up?
We played together. He was going to play in my secondary school, and we ended up playing an improvised duet together somehow. I was twelve then, and since then he’s been my mentor, and he was my entrance to jazz. But then it came natural to learn more about it and be interested. I learned about Miles Davis when I was maybe 14, 15, so it came later. But it’s still been an important part of my learning, to go back to the beginning.
So, obviously, I have my big, you know, favourites like Miles Davis and Chet Baker and all those guys. But I think from a young age I’ve always been really drawn to everything that’s a little bit melancholic. It’s not even a genre. If it’s a little bit melancholic, I’m most likely drawn to it. So it can be everything from hip hop to R&B to pop and, you know, anything.
And how do you think growing up in Stockholm and being in Sweden in general affected your music career? How does the scene there compare to anywhere else? Especially as an immersing artist.
Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of great musicians, and there're a lot of, not communities, but there are lots of people playing music and things happening. But I think what I liked about Rotterdam, for example, was that it was so much more emerged. For example, North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, I played there once, and it was a celebration of music, even though it’s just a jazz festival. Every jazz musician was there, but so was everyone who was grounded in jazz. There was everything, and it was a really big party. There were so many people there that were interested, and we don’t really have that up north in a sense, I would say. It’s a small country, and we’re so far up north in Europe.
So, I love to play abroad. But the scene in Stockholm, it’s good. But now that I’ve signed with Dorado Records in London, I’ve been very inspired by the scene in England. There’s a lot happening, and you have progressive jazz and all those other slashes.
Is there a standout city in Europe you’d say with a healthy progressive jazz scene and everything else you’d like?
Oh, I would say Berlin. Berlin or London, in my opinion.
So, it’s probably best we talk about this album. When I heard about it initially, I read that you locked yourself away in a cabin without heating somewhere in the mountains of Sweden to write it all? How’d a situation like that come about?
My parents, when we moved to Stockholm, didn’t have any relatives or a house there or anything. So, I’ve been missing a concrete place to visit when I go home and three years ago they bought this cabin where I’m originally from. It’s in the middle of the woods and somehow only three minutes from a small ski area, but it’s in the middle of nowhere. It’s very simple. So, I was there in January, and it was like minus 30, and the heating didn’t work, so I had to make a fire every night and never let it out, or it’d literally be freezing cold. The water was frozen too, so I heated up water and maybe got running water an hour per day. It was pretty extreme for putting an album together.
Not going to lie, that just all sounds maybe too extreme for kickstarting the creative process.
Yeah, but since I didn't have anything from my normal life, like I didn't have my phone, internet, or wifi, or TV, or anything, it grounded me. It was like, okay, I’m waking up every day freezing, I have to make a fire. I had to go, like, back to the basics so I could be more focussed. I got into this bubble and routine of what I wanted and needed to do.
I also think, like, in my day-to-day life, there are so many influences and impressions just all around, just being in the city. But when you have nothing, like, nothing to influence you, I just ended up really reflecting and talking to myself a lot, you know? Doing all the things that I don’t normally have the space to do.
Do you think that isolation left an impression on your music then in turn?
Well, I went there for like a month, and it was very concrete somehow. I was, like, okay, I only have this month, and it made me really dive deep into what I wanted to do and think about what I’m doing. Especially lyrics-wise, because it was the first time I was really writing lyrics for my own music.
And, like, I’ve written in diaries and stuff like that. So, now it’s natural to bring into my music. And I took the time to sit with everything. I don’t think it would’ve come out as honest if I had been in the city. Because, like, now, it’s very naked (laughs).
So, basically you put aside a month and told yourself you’re going to come out with a whole new album in that time?
I was not like, this has to be done in a month otherwise, you know, whatever. But I would say that I had a month cleared already, so it worked. But I think if I had not finished, I would’ve stayed until I was done because I think when I experience that space to create in that way, I want to finish off like that as well.
After all that, are you feeling inspired to go on to the next album, or are you going to give yourself a pause?
For me, I’m a very much a, I’m not sure how you would say it, but I’m a, “period person.” In a way that I flow through a lot of musical ideas, so I’m going to create and only do that. And that can be one month, a year, whatever. But then, when it’s in the releasing stag,e I’m in a different mode. And once it’s been released and things settle down, then it’s in my head to go do something else.
Well, congrats on the new album and enjoy that post-release period! Thanks for chatting, Ebba!
Thanks!