vehicle / passenger: CD Release Show!

In "Vehicle/Passenger," the trio gathers around the radical poetry of Marc Alberto, which weaves through energetically improvised pieces and delicate soundscapes. The project explores a queer perspective on body, society, and improvisation, as suggested in the eponymous poem:

"vehicle/passenger
neither guide nor navigator
a carrier of time"

The sound of the trio is characterized by patient and empathic interplay among spoken word, drums, sax, double bass, and analog electronics. Intense and unapologetically political, yet always with introspection and collective awareness, Vehicle / Passenger stands at a unique intersection of music and poetry, offering a powerful commentary on contemporary issues.

Marc Alberto (they/them, AN) is a Euro-Caribbean improviser, award-winning poet and composer. Born in Curaçao, they currently live in the Netherlands. Alberto tours internationally as a saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist and spoken word artist. Alberto is a prolific composer of chamber, film and theater music and works as a musical dramaturge and art researcher.
arts researcher. In addition to his own projects, Alberto plays with greats from almost all genres: Jet Rebel (pop), Legoland (electronic) or Cast Glass (avant-garde). Alberto is co-curator and founder of the poetry and music platform BYMEKAAR, winner of the Queer & Feminist Poetry Award (2023), core member of the group NEW HEROES and the queer collective queer collective BOYS WON'T BE BOYS.

Lesley Mok (they/them, USA) is a percussionist and interdisciplinary artist who works in the fields of sound, installation, film and theater. Lesley is interested in the ways in which social conditions shape who we are, and focuses their work on the overplaying of the human condition to explore ideas about strangeness and privilege. Their work draws on queer and feminist art practices, Chinese practices, Chinese philosophy, Caribbean folkloric music traditions, futurist perspectives and knowledge, futurist perspectives and ancestral knowledge. Her constant explorations with composition and improvisation are particularly evident in her ten-piece improvising chamber ensemble The Living Collection (American Dreams Records), which just won the German Jazz Award 2024 in the category “Best Debut
Album International”. They tour with jazz legends Myra Melford, Tomeka Reid, and John Pattituci, as with up-and-coming artists such as Anna Webber, Tomeka Reid, Nick Dunston and others. “Mok eschews typical narrative structures, even when certain passages evoke a more traditional approach. Solos weave in and out of mewling constructions that can turn themselves inside out like some kind of sonic Möbius strip, constantly shifting the focal point in ways that make us wonder if we heard things correctly from the start.” - Peter Margasak

Florian Herzog (he/him, DE), bassist and composer, is a pioneer of the German and international jazz and avant-garde scene. After living and working in the Netherlands, Cologne and finally New York, he now writes for projects that are avant-garde jazz, pop or electronic, but always everything together. His bass playing has been described by the press as “emancipated, spirited and sensitive” described. His collective bands such as Just Another Foundry, Turn and Trillmann have won several awards and have released dozens of albums together. As a leader, Herzog's projects such as Moon Tree and his recently released quartet album “Almost Natural” are peppered with international collaborations. He has worked with established greats such as Theo Bleckmann, Jim Black and Nils Wogram, but also with the new generation and musicians such as Anna Webber, Elias Stemeseder and Nick Dunston. He is active as a sideman in Germany and the USA and has been curating the series “Monday Meetings” series at Loft Cologne and now the new “CGNYC” series in Cologne. Herzog plays on the album “The Living Collection”, which won the 2024 German Jazz Award for “Best Debut Album International”.