“In the last couple of years reedist, bandleader, and composer Amalie Dahl has enjoyed a stunning artistic ascent in which she’s thrived in a variety of contexts. She’s got a strong solo practice, plays in several excellent, stylistically disparate trios, and has been a superb sideperson. But her quintet Dafnie has been the project that casts the broadest light on her various talents. This excellent combo represents yet another wave of heady, young Norwegian talent, inculding dummer Veslemøy Narvesen, trumpeter Oscar Andreas Haug, trombonist Jørgen Bjelkerud, and double bassist Nicolas Leirtrø, fleshing out the leader’s intricate, beautifully nuanced arrangements and contributing an unceasing stream of inextricably rooted improvisations.(…)”
Peter Margasak, Nowhere Street, January 7th 2025
“(…) »Står Op Med Solen« is an album that wants to be rooted in Norwegian contemporary jazz, but is able to articulate itself far beyond that.”
Jana-Maria Mayer, HHV Mag, May 22nd 2024
“(…) The plush arrangements highlight the lyric side of her writing, with trumpeter Oscar Andreas Haug and trombonist Jørgen Bjelkerud uncorking solos of impressive internal logic and swinging grace, and when Dahl settles into her ballad ‘Hjemve’, where the horns sculpt multi-linear beauty, there’s little doubt that she’s more interested in advancing tradition than she is in tearing it down. Intensity doesn’t need to come through volume or aggression, and here it surfaces through the chamber-like rapport the quintet—which also includes the increasingly ubiquitous drummer Veslemøy Narvesen—possesses.”
Peter Margasak, The Quietus, May 31th 2022
“Danish saxophonist/clarinettist Amalie Dahl is part of a new generation of Scandinavian jazz musicians who have passed through the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim. In the US, jazz schooling can be a problem, but Dafnie is evidence that what they’re teaching the kids up north is all right. Her quintet’s lively spirit and tuneful orientation falls in line with bands like Cortex and Friends & Neighbors. But this LP, her first as a bandleader, also displays Dahl’s strengths as an arranger and a composer. Each tune has a distinct character, drawing upon the ensemble’s strengths, such as Jørgen Bjekerud’s warm, expressive trombone and Vesleøy Narvesen’s non-ironically deployd musical saw.”
Bill Meyer, The Wire Magazine, July 6th 2022
“(…) Dafnie play with free-spirited and open structures while maintaining a mutually supportive interplay. This is combined with a kind of narrative and, sometimes almost dramaturgical development, where both moods and melodies unfold.”
Chris Monsen, 5 out of 6 stars in Klassekampen May 16th 2022
“Dahl is a musician that has a lot to say and knows how to say it, loud and clear and with infectious, playful energy. (…) And she is also a clever and imaginative composer.”
Eyal Hareuveni, Salt Peanuts, May 19th 2022
Interview in Sounddrive.pl: read it here
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