herzog | muche | nillesen
TON - HERZOG | MUCHE | NILLESEN
Matthias Muche – trombone
Constantin Herzog – double bass
Etienne Nillesen – snare drums
HERZOG | MUCHE | NILLESEN is a trio for advanced improvisation at the intersection of contemporary music, experimental playing techniques, and free sound exploration. With trombone, double bass, and snare drums, the three musicians develop a highly focused music that is both physically and acoustically precise, placing timbre, resonance, and microtonal friction at its core.
The instruments are conceived and played beyond their traditional roles. Breath, friction, overtone fields, and subtle movements shape dense, interwoven sound spaces. The focus is not on effects or virtuosity, but on a carefully balanced whole that unfolds gradually and calls for a particular quality of listening.
The music moves between intimate reduction and expansive, continuously shifting soundscapes. Dynamics, form, and tonality emerge in the moment and remain deliberately open, creating space for individual perception and concentrated attention.
“It must be impressive to experience the space filled with the omnipresent sounds of this adventurous trio.” - Dolf Mulder
Matthias Muche - TROMBONE
Etienne Nillesen - EXTENDED SNARE DRUM
Constantin Herzog - DOUBLE BASS
Here you find further materials:
https://linktr.ee/herzogmuchenillesen
https://www.youtube.com/@herzog-muche-nillesen
https://www.instagram.com/ton_herzog_muche_nillesen/
NEW CD HERZOG | MUCHE | NILLESEN - ANASÝNTHESI,
Release at May 23rd, 2025
Discographie (IMPAKT)
TON plays HERZOG / MUCHE / NILLESEN
TON plays LA BERGE / GREEENSTONE / PLUTA / WOOLEY
Reviews:
TON meets SARAH DAVACHI
Martin Hufner writes in Neue Musik Zeitung 2024: “TON always focuses on new musical emphases in their programs at the boundaries of advanced playing forms of experimental music, between improvisation and composition. The goal is to find an abstract language with its own character; music that ventures beyond well-trodden paths into new adventures in sound, playfully stretching genre terms. TON is known for eliciting precisely those sounds from their instruments that one does not associate with so-called traditional playing techniques—but with an ease that does not chase after sound sensations like unknown orchids or butterflies. This is the only way a new, mimetically intertwined whole emerges here. As always with TON, everything is played with a care that does not provide sharp surprises for the listeners but, paradoxically enough, is a continuous surprise. Behind every crackle and impulse, behind every veiled overtone, there lurks a special appeal for the ears. A great play in terms of form, dynamics, register, and fluid tonality. Do you have time for this? You need do nothing more than be there. No one will try to convince you, no one will persuade you to do anything; you simply go along this path… or not. Your decision.“
TON plays Herzog | Muche | Nillesen
Martin Schray - freejazzblog (05/2024): "...the focus is not on the individual signature, but on a communal experience, the three instruments merging into one.What is more, there is also the unique sound associated with the venue: the album was recorded in Cologne at Church St. Gertrud, one of the brutalist concrete churches from the 1960s. With its extreme acoustics it adds another quality to the music. Sound in a specific space has always been an essential part of the trio. In this sense, they have experimented with different playing setups, with spoken parts and soundscapes, spatializations via external sound funnels or quite purely with the naked instruments.
This is the basis that the thirteen pieces unfold seemingly easy. The titles arise from the phrase “Inspiration Is A Condition Of The Heartstrings Being Plucked And Vibration“ plus some kind of encore, “Hello," with vocals by Anthony Moore. In this last piece, one of the aforementioned spoken parts, Moore addresses the listeners claiming that the sentence we are about to hear will have disappeared by the time we have reached its end. Actually, it’s a piece that recapitulates on a meta-level the process of making music by this trio, a perfect summary of the album.
The form of interaction between space and sound, playing attitudes and the sound possibilities of the individual instruments is at the heart of the music. Nothing sounds strained, nothing gets lost in the nowhere, no cheap imitations of the playing of the fellow musicians - the trio acts as a unit from the beginning, the fusion of sounds and dynamics is the goal - and that throughout at a high level of intensity. simply an excellent album."
TON is supported by the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Biographies:
Etienne Nillesen’s exploration of the snare drum highlights the diverse tonal and temporal intricacies of the instrument, employing extended durations that emphasize gradual variations in texture and overtone complexity. Through a combination of traditional and extended techniques, he unveils an array of unexplored and unexpected sonic dimensions within the seemingly limited realm of the snare drum. By utilizing circular motions to explore different areas of the drumhead and deliberately varying the contact points, Etienne generates a diverse range of pitches, harmonics, and overtones in which a rhythmic macrostructure emerges with accents appearing freely.
His music, despite its minimalist approach, achieves a remarkable complexity of sound. Each meticulously crafted note and nuance demands undivided attention and concentration from both the performer and the listener, fostering a deep connection between the two. The act of listening becomes an integral part of the experience. Etienne is currently on the faculty of the ArtEZ Academy of Music in Arnhem (NLD), where he teaches improvisation and drums.
http://etiennenillesen.com/
Matthias Muche is a trombonist and composer living in Cologne. He represents a generation of composer-performers for whom the distinction between jazz, improvised music, and contemporary music no longer applies. He confidently draws from the diverse heritage of the avant-gardes of the 20th and 21st centuries - as a composer as well as a virtuoso improviser and performer.
His work focuses on interdisciplinary projects in music, theatre, dance, and video art, with which he has performed in over 50 countries. In his performances, he uses a variety of playing techniques: recordings of speech and soundscapes in the trombone, spatial expansion through external funnels, interactive computer graphics as synesthetic perception, or simply the pure, naked trombone.
Muche was awarded the WDR Jazz Prize 2021 in the Improvisation category.
“[…] Like Vinko Globokar and Stuart Dempster before him, German composer-trombonist Matthias Muche explores this often-overlooked instrument’s potential to extend the sonic possibilities of the human body.” Emily Pothast - THE WIRE.
linktr.ee/matthiasmuche
Constantin Herzog is active as a bassist in and between various musical genres: new music, improvised music, and jazz. Music for film, radio plays, and stage with double bass, electric bass, violone, and electronics.
Performances include TON, DEHIO, consord, Oxana Omelchuk, Multiple Joy(ce) Orchestra, Ensemble tra i tempi, Ensemble Garage, Ensemble electronic ID, Ensemble Musikfabrik, GroBA, Studio Dan. CD releases on Anna Ott, Clean Feed, NRW Records, gligg Records, Unit Records, Impakt Records, GOGO Records, WERGO, HatHut.
Classical double bass studies with Detmar Kurig at the HfMT Cologne, jazz double bass studies at the music colleges of Würzburg and Cologne with Rudi Engel and Dieter Manderscheid.
Founding member of IMPAKT-Köln.