Grimal/Veras/Dumoulin/Pallemaerts play the music of Alexandra Grimal www.alexandragrimal.com +33 (0) 6 66 13 64 95 [email protected]

Alexandra Grimal, saxophonist and composer was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1980. Master’s Degree at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, the Netherlands in 2005, she has also been a jazz student in the «Con- servatoire National Supérieur de Paris» (CNSM) and in the Sibelius Academy of Helsinki, Finland. She just released her album “shape” for Marge records (2009). prizes and awards Tremplin l’Esprit Jazz à St Germain des Prés 2008 (France), Soloist Prize Grand Prix du Tremplin Européen de Jazz d’Avignon 2007 (France) with Grimal Quartet, 1st prize Concours National de Jazz de La Défense 2007 (France) with Alexandra Grimal Quartet, group prize International Contest for Young Jazz Soloists of Fribourg 2007 (Switzerland) winner with congratula- tions of the judges under the presidency of Martial Solal Winner of the Jean-Luc Lagardère Fondation, musician grant 2009 collaborations Uffe Krokfors, Jarmo Savolainen, Alain Jean-Marie, Jean-Jacques Avenel, Nelson Veras, Dré Pallemaerts, Giovanni di Domenico, Jozef Dumoulin, Edouard Ferlet, Rhoda Scott, Manolo Cabras, Claus Kaasgaard, Chris Jennings, Stéphane Kerecki, João Lobo, Toma Gouband, Mathieu Calleja, John Betsch, Patrick Goraguer, Anne Paceo, Anders Holst, Pierre Perchaud, Robin Verheyen, Lynn Cassiers, Birgitte Lyregaard, Yves Rousseau, Magnus Wiik, Andreas Håkestad, Christian Skjødt... discography Alexandra Grimal trio “shape” Futura Marge (France) 2009 Edouard Ferlet quartet “Filigrane” Melisse (France), november 2009 Fred Norel “dreamseekers” Melisse Music (France) 2009 Ruben Samama Quintet, « Hotaru» OAP Records (The Netherlands) 2007 Julio Resende Quartet “dA ALMA” Clean Feed (Portugal) 2008

Born the 6 august 1977 in Salvador-BA Brazil At age 14, Nelson Veras moved to Fance and played with Pat Metheny in the movie JUST A DREAM directed by Franck Cassenti. On the same year he played in Paris Jazz Festival. At age 16, he starts the NELSON VERAS QUARTET with Michel Benita, Eric Barret and and performs on the Marciac Jazz Festival (opening for Herbie Hancock), Nice Jazz Festival, Vannes Jazz Festival, etc In 1996, he records for Aldo Romanos Intervista with Palle Danielson and . He also played with Rick Margitza, Bireli Lagrene, Jean-Michel Pilc, Daniel Hu- mair, Michel Grailler, Hein Van de Gein In 1997, he played in Michel Petruccianis group young lions , did several concerts in Antilles and performed with Intervista group. In 1998, he went back to Brazil and was one of the 5 winners of the visa competition of brazilian popular music among 200 musicians. In 1999, he performs with Gary Peacock, Lee Konitz on a tribute to Michel Petrucciani. Nelson is currently freelancing in Paris, and plays with, Magic Malik, Olivier Ker Ourio, Gildas Bocle et le groupe Celtic Tales, Dominique Dipiazza, Jean Louis Matinier, Mathieu Chazarenc Trio and others 2004 he records his first album as a leader for LABEL BLEU 2004 Tour with saxophonist 2004 Record and tour with saxophonist Steve Coleman Jozef Dumoulin was born in 1975 in Ingelmunster, in the pretty deep Belgian countryside. Already as a kid he was very attracted to music and kept fooling around at the two pianos at home, which lead to oc- casional irritation of the other members of the household. Throughout his childhood and teenage years he attended classes in piano, organ, clavichord, euphonium, harmony and some drums. Around the age of 16 he discovered jazz, and spent a lot of time in the local library to find records and zapping the tv at night in the hope to bump into some live jazz. At 18 he studied psychology for two years but then de- cided to go to the Brussels Conservatory where he was tutored by Diederik Wissels and Nathalie Loriers. He also spent two years at the Musikhochschule of Cologne taking classes with John Taylor. Musically, Dumoulin has his finger in lots of pies. Initially he played the piano, as in his formal band with singer Barbara Wiernik on the CD ‘Eclipse’, which was released on the belgian label Mogno in 2001. Meanwhile, since 2000, he has developed his unique sound on the Fender Rhodes combining it with electronics. Using this setup, he joined forces a number of existing formations (such as the Magic Malik Orchestra, Reggie Washington Trio Tree, Erwin Vann Quartet, Octurn, Dre Pallemaerts , Othin Spake, Benzine, Nar- cissus Quartet, ...), still finding enough time to engage in other enriching get-togethers (Brussels Jazz Orchestra, Toots Thielemans, Aka Moon, Belmondo brothers, David Lynx, ...). He shared the stage with Mark Turner, Bill Carothers, Jaime Torres, Sekouba Traore, Skoota Warner, Trevor Dunn, Hilmar Jensson, Andrew D’Angelo, Joseph Bowie, Ronny Jordan and T.N. Seshagopalan, among others. Now he’s living in Paris and is working on his own music with both acoustic and electronic formations, such as Lidlboj (with Lynn Cassiers on voice, Bo Van der Werf on baritone saxophone and Eric Thielemans on drums), this besides his work as a side-man. He performed all over the globe and can be heard on an increasing number of records. lidlboj’s first record “Trees are always right” will be released in october 2009 on the French label BEE- JAZZ.

Dre Pallemaerts plays the drums, teaches at the “CNSM” in Paris-France and at the “Lemmens Insti- tuut” in Leuven-Belgium, works as a sound-engineer, creates electronic music, composed and recorded his new cd “Pan Harmonie” featuring Mark Turner (sax), Stéphane Belmondo (trumpet), Bill Carrothers (piano) and Jozef Dumoulin (rhodes). Played over 27 years in the international jazz scene with many art- ists like Toots Thielemans, , John Scofield, Bob Brookmeyer, Philip Catherine, Kenny Wheeler, Norma Wintston, , Art Farmer, James Williams, Ernestine Anderson,... Is currently a member of the Belmondo-Yusef Lateef sextet, Belmondo quintet, Bert Joris quartet, Baptiste Trotignon-David El Malek quartet, Andy Scherrer sextet, Erwin Vann’s “let’s call Ed”, Robin Verheyen quartet, Bill Carrothers trio... PRESS le blog de Jazz Magazine (...) “la saxophoniste révèle-t-elle l’autre ou un autre versant d’un même parcours, son envers. Tout ici est de la plume de la saxophoniste sous des formes complexes et étendues qui ne pourraient se jouer avec aucun autre groupe. (...) tout en retenue, avec un sax plus Mark Turner que Joe Lovano, parfois à la limite de l’émission, contrastant avec les plans post-coltraniens qu’elle sait «envoyer» dans d’autres contextes (...) Et l’on pense à ce parti pris de distance et de non-expressivité qui a fait son chemin de Steve Coleman à Octurn (...) l’énergie con- tenue se libérant lentement (...) des atmosphères sonores où à peine se dégage un véritable soliste. Par cette torpeur pourtant les quatre musiciens ne se laissent jamais gagner, embarqués qu’ils sont dans des rapides harmoniques encaissés et tortueux qui requièrent une attention de tous les instants (...) Franck Bergerot (février 2009 à propos de Grimal/Veras/Dumoulin/Pallemaerts) - le blog de Jazz Magazine « Alexandra Grimal cherche, explore, expérimente. Live, de surcroît.(...) quand elle se pose trois soirs de suite aux Disquaires avec pour partenaires Nelson Veras, Josef Dumoulin et Dré Pallemaerts, impossible de lui échap- per(...) Le soprano, affirme une sonorité pleine et personnelle, le ténor explore une voie médiane entre force et subtilité, dans la lignée d’un Mark Turner(...) La cohésion du quartette est alors impressionnante, et l’on regrette de ne pouvoir revenir le soir suivant écouter la suite de ces échanges, de cette élaboration en direct d’une passion- nante alchimie collective où l’on entend le tissu sonore d’un groupe inédit trouver devant nous son épaisseur, et marier ses couleurs(…) » Thierry Quenum (mai 2008) - le blog de Jazz Magazine “Une journée après le compte rendu de Thierry Quénum, les mêmes… ou presque: Patrick Goraguer a rem- placé Dré Pallemaerts. Même constat que Thierry: ça travaille. Et on ne résiste à en rajouter une couche sur les compliments de la veille. Compositions récentes, mais pas totalement méconnues du nouveau venu (…) C’est qu’ici, on n’est pas dans le plan de carrière et dans le marketting, mais plutôt dans l’échange, le question- nement, l’expérimentation(...) On n’est jamais dans l’abstraction sonore radicale, le lyrisme participe d’une écriture mélodique très lisible” Franck Bergerot (mai 2008)