# Is what jazz and the world need right now? Tribute to Miles Davis and a “meeting” with the local Pocket Corner Sextett։ Photos

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2026/06/02/is-what-jazz-and-the-world-need-right-now-tribute-to-miles-davis-and-a-meeting-with-the-local-pocket-corner-sextett%d6%89-photos/
- Published: 2026-06-02T18:17:45+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**Then the festival weekend got underway in earnest in Stavanger. From two concerts
on Tuesday, three on Wednesday and Thursday, to five yesterday, in addition to a
jam led by saxophonist Heidi Kvelvane.**

Since colleague Lars Mossefinn has other and more important tasks for the rest of
the weekend (the absence has been approved by the editor), coverage of the festival
here will, of necessity, be a little less. But I was “where I was supposed to be”
also that day and evening, which started with a tribute to Miles Davis, and “landed”
with the locally based Pocket Corner Sextett.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/didrik-fra-siden-
500x374.jpg?resize=640%2C479&ssl=1)

And these two projects were actually the perfect combination this evening, even 
though Silje Nergaard gave a concert in the Stavanger Concert Hall with the Stavanger
Symphony Orchestra, Bendik Hofseth played in the Stavangeren and the Polish electric
bassist Kinga Głyk held court in Fiskepiren. I chose to go local this evening, so
the local press and the other visitors in the press corps will have to take responsibility
for the concerts I chose not to.

**Miles Smiles**

May 26 of this year marked the 100th anniversary of Miles Davis’ birth.. On that
occasion, Maijazz wanted to mark the anniversary with a concert concept that aims
to involve the city’s youth studying music. Preferably students from the Faculty
of Performing Arts at the University of Stavanger and Young Talents in Bjergsted(
UTB)․

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/kjetil-moster-500x374.
jpg?resize=640%2C479&ssl=1)

Miles Davis, along with John Coltrane (who also turns 100 this year – on September
23rd), are two of the greatest soloists and innovators in music history. Perhaps
the most influential figures in American jazz music in the last century, from the
late forties until Coltrane left our planet on July 17th, 1967 and Miles’s death
on September 28th, 1991.

In addition to being a leading trumpeter and improviser, Miles constantly forged
new musical paths. Many of his albums have become iconic snapshots of stylistic 
changes in American art music. Releases such as Birth of Cool, Milestones, Kind 
of Blue, Miles Smiles, In a Silent Way, Bitches Brew, We Want Miles, Aura (the project
he did led by Danish trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg) and Tutu (with bassist Marcus Miller
as an important collaborator), are some examples of this.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/glenn-brun-500x374.
jpg?resize=640%2C479&ssl=1)

He was in Norway several times at the end of his life, including in Molde in 1984(
the fantastic “Midnattsmessen”) and in 1985. He also visited Nattjazz in Bergen 
and Sardines in Oslo, before he left us at the end of September (actually on your
birthday), September 28, 1991.

This means that most of the people involved in this concert in Folken were not even“
intentional” when Miles left us.

Such concerts tend to become a kind of “student evening at the folk high school”,
without there being anything negative in that. But the requirements for how to evaluate
such concerts are different than if there were fully “professional” musicians on
stage.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/oyvind-dale-500x368.
jpg?resize=640%2C471&ssl=1)

Entering Miles Davis’s musical universe is no easy feat. But I must say that what
we heard from the students in Stavanger this evening was charming and nice. Many
good soloists, and a bunch of good vocalists. And it is especially so when you don’t
quite know what is going to happen when one moment you are served a beer in the 
bar at Spor 5, and the next moment you discover that the bar staff was one of the
excellent saxophonists playing, while one of the vocalists who led “Milestones”,
an hour later wanted you to evaluate which grape type was used in two different 
white wines in the bar.

The concert was divided into two sections. The first with small band compositions,
which never consisted of less than two to three vocalists, three guitarists, a bunch
of keyboard players, guitarists and comp. In the second section we had Bjergsted
Jazzensemble, who performed fine arrangements of compositions for which Miles was
listed as responsible.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/ola-hoyer-500x342.
jpg?resize=640%2C438&ssl=1)

The first section dealt with Miles’s history in chronological order, and as they
approached the “present” the music became more and more interesting. Many fine soloists,
both vocally and instrumentally, which made this something much more than a “student
evening at a folk high school”.

The big band section was outstanding. Here, they had clearly worked a lot on Miles’
collaboration with Gil Evans, and the result included excellent ensemble playing
and a number of brilliant solo performances. It will be exciting to follow this 
group further into the jazz scene.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/stale-birkeland-
500x401.jpg?resize=640%2C513&ssl=1)

**In Didrik Ingvaldsen’s pocket**

Pocket Corner is an ensemble that has existed in Stavanger since 1986. All the time
with trumpeter Didrik Ingvaldsen as leader and creator of ideas. Now they are turning
40 years old as a kind of rocking free jazz band. On that occasion, they had invited
distinguished guests to the concert at Maijazz. Saxophonist Kjetil Møster came from
Bergen, who has influenced the Norwegian and European music scene for 20 years –
especially in jazz and experimental music towards the contemporary music field.

Bassist Ola Høyer also came from Bergen, whom we know from bands and projects such
as Cortex, Moon Relay, Telehiv and Honest John. Pianist Øyvind Dale is also originally
from Bergen, but lives in Oslo, and has played with Ingvaldsen in a number of different
constellations. He also plays regularly with Significant Time, which we heard here
two days ago, Dag Magnus Narvesen and the extremely creative Kitchen Orchestra (
where are they actually on the program this year?).

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/pocket-corner-sextet-
alle-500x374.jpg?resize=640%2C479&ssl=1)

The basis of the band is intact with Glenn Brun Henriksen on alto saxophone and 
drummer Ståle Birkeland. Both of these are ringleaders with 20 years of experience
in the band and are otherwise present in a number of band constellations (such as
Kitchen Orchestra) in the “freer” part of jazz in Stavanger, much of which has its
origins in saxophonist Frode Gjerstad, accordionist Eivind One Pedersen and descendants
such as Paal Nilssen-Love, Per Zanussi and many more.

It’s enough to say right away: This was the highlight for me at this year’s Maijazz!
When a hard-working musician and bandleader like Didrik Ingvaldsen succeeds to such
an extent with a project he has had as a “child of his heart” for 40 years, and 
which has never received the attention it deserves, it was great to discover that
he hit the “inner tier” by a good margin yesterday. By expanding the band with the
three guests, the project got a boost many have missed previously, and everything
was “like a bullet” from the first to the last note.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/milestones-bjergsted-
500x315.jpg?resize=640%2C403&ssl=1)

This was music with heart and brain in the “new” jazz that came with free jazz in
the 1970s, where relatively simple themes were given an almost heavenly drive, and
which was exactly what I missed from the many of the 40 records they have made since
the beginning.

On the left flank we got a piano playing I have never heard before from Øyvind Dale.
He practically threw himself over the keys and “kicked and hit” like the purest 
Don Pullen in the fierce songs, while he could almost be mistaken for a young Paul
Bley when they took it down, as in a beautiful sequence where he played a duo with
Ingvaldsen. Bassist Ola Høyer “hammered” over the bass strings, and was right up
there on his toes, as we remember him from several concerts with Cortex, and on 
the far right, the Vossinger Birkeland with a playful and driving drumming that 
kicked and hit in all directions, as if it were his last energy going out.

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/mmilestones-combo-
500x332.jpg?resize=640%2C425&ssl=1)

And in front, on the left, the collaborator throughout all these years, Glenn Brun
Henriksen, who knows exactly where Ingvaldsen wants to go with the music, and who
delivered some solos that “sweep the walls”. In the middle, Kjetil Møster with his
usual, energetic tenor saxophone playing, as we know it from a number of the projects
he is involved in, where energy is in the driver’s seat.

Next to him, on the right, the bandleader, with trumpet and piccolo trumpet, with
an energetic playing that you almost “never” hear here on the rock. He writes excellent
themes, and lifts the compositions up into the universe where you could hear both
an energetic Bobby Bradford, the hard-playing legends Freddy Hubbard and Lee Morgan
and the lyrical and creative playing of Don Cherry. And all these legends, excellently
combined in Ingvaldssen’s distinctive and excellent playing.

Now we can only hope that this combination of Pocket Corner can go on its well-deserved
triumphal march across the country and the world. Because this energy discharge (
there have been a few in the past few days) is something that jazz and the world
need right now!

![](https://i0.wp.com/salt-peanuts.eu/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/didrik.jpg?resize
=640%2C479&ssl=1)

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