Accordionist Frode Haltli has a unique ability to communicate, and seems to have a natural talent for moving between a wide variety of musical styles. ‘Vagabonde Blu’ is his fourth album under his own name, and his first as a solo musician.
The album was recorded live in concert at Tomba Emmanuelle (the mausoleum of artist Emanuel Vigeland) in Oslo, in a room with such powerful and unusual acoustics that his playing is influenced by the room itself.
Haltli’s repertoire includes a wide selection of modern classical works, and he has performed with string orchestras, sinfoniettas and symphony orchestras all over the world. He has collaborated with the Arditti Quartet and several other string quartets.
His debut record, ‘Looking on Darkness’, was released by ECM in 2002 to highly favourable reviews. ECM also released the album ‘Passing Images’, where he played together with trumpet player Arve Henriksen, violist Garth Knox and vocalist Maja Ratkje, and the duo album ‘Yeraz’, a collaboration with saxophonist Trygve Seim. He played music with roots in the Norwegian folk music tradition in the band Rusk, together with folk singer Unni Løvlid and fiddler Vegar Vårdal, and has in recent years been involved with several projects together with fiddler Gjermund Larsen.
