The saxophonist Maxime Bender is part of a new young jazz artists generation from Luxembourg, inspired by a large scale of genres and moving away from the typical jazz routine.
As a leader in several bands, he takes advantage of a multiplicity of projects to showcase his different facets as a composer and saxophone player: the Maxime Bender 4tet, the Maxime Bender Orchestra, the Maxime Bender Group featuring David Binney and the last new project Maxime Bender Universal Sky.
: HAS PLAYED
Jazz à Vienne, Calvi Jazz Festival, Sunset-Sunside, Jazz dans la Ville, Studio de l'Ermitage, Nancy Jazz Pulsations (FR), Ghent Jazz Festival, Gaume Jazz Festival (BE), Edinburgh Jazz Festival (UK), Bratislava Jazz Festival (SK), Kaunas Jazz Festival (LT), Leverkusener Jazztage, Burghausen Jazz Festival, Kulturzentrum Schlachthof Bremen, Jazzclub Unterfahrt (DE), Jazz Festival Agadir & Tanger (MO), Athens Jazz Festival (GR), Jazz Presov (SK), Paradox (NL), ...
: PRESS QUOTES
"The top of contemporary jazz." - Soultrain
"The kind of records one knows one will come back to." - Jazz Magazine France
"This is pure and instrumental jazz." - Melodie & Rhytmus
"It’s a real treat... Jazz quartet reinvented." - Jazz Podium Germany
“The quartet of saxophonist Maxime Bender… A true maturity and a consuming desire to do battle with the best.” - Alex Dutilh, France Musique, Open Jazz
: BIOGRAPHY
MAXIME BENDER'S UNIVERSAL SKY
The universe has no boundaries, no limitations. We all live under the same sky, and we are connected through so many things, one of them being music. Music brings people together, people from all over the world, whatever language they may speak, through music, everyone can communicate with each other.
Maxime Bender’s new project, “Universal Sky”, with Manu Codjia on guitar, Jean-Yves Jung on organ and Jerome Klein on drums, is a French-Luxembourgish mix. This project is all about eliminating boundaries and using music to share emotions. The four members of this band are all enjoying successful careers performing as leaders and sidemen of a variety of projects, and they hereby bring together a vast pool of experience and talent on a single stage.
: MAXIME BENDER 4TET
The Maxime Bender 4tet tries to take a bold step and definitely move away from the typical jazz routine as we've come to know it. The safety of the usual harmonical and rhythmical structures that usually shape a jazz 4tet's identity and behaviour are dissolved and recycled into something fresher, freer, newer and certainly more exciting, opening up new spaces of spontaneous composition, direct and instant musical communication, always aiming for a totally uninhibited flow of creative energy.
Maxime Bender on saxophone, Sebastian Sternal on piano, Markus Braun on bass and Silvio Morger on drums will do everything within the limits of their musical possibilities to move towards a moment of musical freedom, and take the listener with them.
