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Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@abovoice/videos

Spotify artist page: https://open.spotify.com/artist/7z8P55fksPikrpZlDkmqdo?si=0YRIpPs1SumtQ6SX4zrBSQ

Record label: https://www.abovoice.com

Jazz Guitar Today (USA) interview with Niklas 12/2023:

https://jazzguitartoday.com/2023/12/jazz-guitar-in-finland-and-beyond/

ABOUT

Niklas Winter is a Finnish jazz guitarist and composer. Winter has made 10 records as a leader and has been active as a sideman in several bands. He tours frequently the world making around 50 concerts per year in the Nordic countries and in Europe, Asia and the US.

During the years Winter has performed with; Kenny Wheeler, Henry Lowther, Ulf Wakenius, Jesse van Ruller, John Stowell, Kirite Kanawa, Cameron Brown, Ted Curson, Lars Jansson, Jukkis Uotila, Teemu Viinikainen, Karl-Martin Almqvist, Fumio Yasuda, Ino Nobuyoshi, Jani Moder, Morten Lund, Emil Hess, Jesper Bodilsen, Severi Pyysalo, Turku Philharmonic Orchestra and with many more.

Winter’s passion is writing and performing original music.

Winter has a fresh, modern sound. This is original and very exciting music and Niklas Winter Quartet has surely been a great experience at many festivals. Tor Hammerø /Jazznyt (Norway)

‘Missä hyvänsä Niklas Winter soittaa, hänen herkästi kaipailevan kitaransa tunnistaa. Winter  tuntuu etsivän käsitteiksi taipumatonta, jotain vielä ja ehkä pysyvästi näkymätöntä. Soundi on ollut samanlainen vuosia. Kari Salminen / Turun Sanomat (2.9.2022)

Niklas Winter’s poetic playing shows great knowledge of improvisational skills. Jörgen Östberg /Orkester Journalen (Sweden)

” In Winter’s playing listener can hear plainness and intelligence. Winter’s improvisations and harmonies look back to the history of jazz but also expresses the atmosphere of today.”Hiroki Sugita/Jazz Life (Japan)

Trust in fact, was key, as was a fundamental sense of good time. Without a drummer or a bassist, and with the two guitarists sometimes dissolving into spare sections where time was, at best, suggested, it became even more essential that the two could internalize that time and know where it was, without it being explicitly there. It’s in the context of the duo that an artist is at his/her most exposed; not only are their abilities, instincts and improvisational élan laid bare, but their communication skills—or lack thereof—are impossible to disguise. Viinikainen and Winter needn’t have worried, as it was clear, from their Tampere Jazz Happening performance, that this was a duo communicating at a very deep level, playing relatively quiet music that was, nevertheless, thoroughly captivating.

JOHN
KELMAN / ALL ABOUT JAZZ (USA)

Niklas Winter   GRADUALE

The album consists of Winter original compositions combined with his arrangements of the oldest written music in Finland.

Henry Lowther – trumpet and fluegelhorn, Niklas Winter – guitar, Severi Pyysalo – vibraphone, Juho Laitinen – cello, Utopia Chamber Choir.

”The result is an entirely successful run of fourteen very different tracks that hang together to provide an overall aesthetic that is both meditative and swinging.” Phil Johnson on the Graduale album, London Jazz News, 2023 (UK)

The link below takes you to the Finnish record label Abovoice. Buy this album and albums of many other Finnish jazz musicians on this site.

www.abovoice.com

CONCERTS 2025