Collective 4tet

Music Samples:

Leo Records; allmusic.com: In Transition, Moving Along, Synopsis, Orca, The Ropedancer

Press Quotes:

„... an improvisational work of unfolding interplay which is very much worth listening to.“: JAZZ HIHYO TOKYO
„... the four musicians are psychically locked in, like dolphins leaping as a school.“: CMJ NEW MUSIC REPORT
„... their every lick imbued with jazz history.“: HI FI NEWS
„... telepathically matching each other in texture and intensity throughout.“: JAZZ NOW
„... a rousing and enthralling experience.“: JAZZIZ MAGAZINE
„... the Collective 4tet contrive to play with fire and direction.“: THE WIRE
„... history is still being made.“: BEN WATSON, LINER NOTES
„... four sound as one, as cohesive interplay unfolds with seemingly logical abandon.“: ALL-MUSIC GUIDE
„... a group of master musicians.“: KZSU, STANFORD UNIVERSITY
„... like the entire history of jazz, as told through microfiche-size miniatures.“: TIME OUT NEW YORK
„The Collective 4tet shows on Synopsis that its connections run to subcortical depths..after 18-plus minutes pass in what seems like five, it's suddenly clear that the piece is so well developed that it almost sounds pre-composed.“: ONE FINAL NOTE
„The music is elusive, free, and consistent.“: ALL ABOUT JAZZ
„...a marvelous collective.“: DOWNTOWN MUSIC GALLERY NYC
„... so precise that it almost makes one wonder if they are all telepathic.“: SWING JOURNAL TOKYO
„... very fine rhythmic repartee allows the music to evolve with a shimmering logic.“: HI FI NEWS
„... a group music that ebbs and flows with a commanding open dynamism.“: CADENCE MAGAZINE
„What makes this work so well is the ensemble balance.“: CODA MAGAZINE
„The Collective 4tet find a shared voice and sing beautifully with it.“: SIGNAL TO NOISE
„ ... the music begins to exist on its own plane, creating its own laws of physics, as if each note had a performative effect on the universe.“: ALL-MUSIC GUIDE
„...this is powerful stuff, and well recommended.“: ONE FINAL NOTE
„...Moving Along has so many things going on at once that you can listen again and again and always find something new to catch your interest.“: SPLENDID MAGAZINE
„Their music is as free as the wind, wild, fierce, agonizing, but also strong, coherent, sensitive, with all four musicians sharing the same vision and sense of focus.“: Freejazz-stef.blogspot.com
„Spreading the envelope through extended instrumental techniques, the results stem from an exquisite distillation of the linguistic: simultaneous explorations, timbre and sound space approached from a contemporary compositional outlook and original reflections on improvisation serve to illustrate the emergence of a collectively conceived language.“: modisti.com
„Collective 4tet is probably one of the greatest free jazz groups of all time.“: Customer Review AMAZON.COM
„...a magisterial performance by one of the great ensembles in free music.“: JAZZ JOURNAL
„This collective improvisation evolves into music that can only be called beautiful and in perfect harmony.“: SWING JOURNAL, JAPAN
„The Collective 4tet is producing some of the most exciting and important music of our time. This group deserves a place in the grand pantheon of making music that is meaningful in the highest order. “: JEFFREY R. INGBER
„... the Collective 4tet achieve a near-telepathic unity which sets them apart.“: PENGUIN GUIDE TO JAZZ

Collective 4tet

New Music Composed & Performed by

The Collective 4tet in 1997 at Queen Elisabeth Hall, London with Jeff Hoyer - trombone (integral member from 1994 - 2006)

New line-up since 2008

Heinz Geisser - percussion
Arthur Brooks - trumpet, flugelhorn
Mark Hennen - piano
William Parker - bassviolin

Inititiated by percussionist Heinz Geisser in 1992 the Collective 4tet creates music on the highest level of musical interplay. The four musicians perform at a creative peak composing each piece of music in real time and making each of their performances a unique musical adventure. As British reviewer George Kerr wrote:

"...there is a telepathic coordination and cohesion which makes the listening easy. Approaching each piece with a blank mental state - a jazz tabula rasa - the Collective 4tet seems to generate both subject matter and interpretation out of thin air."

Their music has also been compared to abstract expressionist painting for its explosive energy and dynamic range of sounds and rhythms beyond traditional musical structures. The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD which rates the Collective 4tet's album "ORCA" a four star recording (4th & 5th Edition, optimum rating: ****), notes:

"Abstract Expessionism is much misunderstood. Woed by the idea of `action` painting, to many reviewers tend to see in it mere gesture, form without substance. This is a more relevant point than it might seem in this context, because those who write about the Collective Quartet (or 4tet, as they seem to prefer) almost invariably draw their analogies from fine art. Nothing wrong with that, provided no one is misled into thinking that this is shapelessly abstract music. It is packed with melodic figures which rise out of the ensemble sound in much the way intelligent shapes emerge out of Jackson Pollocks's shimmering surfaces."

The Collective 4tet has toured the United States and Europe and has recorded for Swiss National Radio and BBC. Their five CDs "Ropedancer", "Orca", "Live at Crescent", "Synopsis" and "Moving Along" on Leo Records were praised by international critics including several four star ratings in the Penguin Guide to Jazz (9th Edition).

2006 was marked by the early death of Jeff Hoyer but the group reassembled with trumpeter Arthur Brooks in 2008.

"In Transition", released on Leo Records in 2009, is the first album in the new line-up.

Collective 4tet on Leo Records


LEO LAB CD 021 mp3 sample	LEO LAB CD 031 mp3 sample	LEO LAB CD 043 mp3 sample

CD LR 380	CD LR 418	CD LR 529

Contact: heinz@geisser.com