Metronome: Homebeat Present: Holden & Zimpel

James Holden & Warclaw Zimpel  

Homebeat are delighted to present the wonderful collaboration between groundbreaking UK electronic producer James Holden and Polish clarinettist Warclaw Zimpel as they form Holden & Zimpel: a collaborative alliance wherein these two versatile modern composers might explore their deepest improvisational urges in an intimate setting, to strikingly lush, hypnotic and deeply emotive effect.  

Two like-minded masters of their instrument come together in an in-the-moment lyrical conversation between alto clarinet and modular synth, cementing the joyful convergence of their disparate musical journeys in an explosion of raw musical creativity in its most primal form.
 
Long established in their own respective fields of electronica and jazz, Holden & Zimpel’s paths would first cross at the 2018 edition of The Hague’s Rewire Festival, where mutual feelings of respect drove the pair to seek each other out for an introduction. Their first recordings happened later that year in Holden’s London studio, during four snatched days of between-shows downtime for Waclaw, where the pair committed to laying down one composition a day to gradually assemble a four track EP of deliciously krauty in-the-moment improvisations. The resulting richly textured Long Weekend EP pitted Holden’s handmade modular synth rig against Zimpel’s multifariously expressive alto clarinet, judiciously supplemented by organ, voice, assorted percussion and (on Tuesday & Wednesday) the Balearic-tinged guitar playing of Zimpel’s long-time collaborator Jakub Ziolek, making for an immersive and transcendent lost weekend of deep listening.   

With this initial release emerging on the eve of the pandemic, the duo’s first scheduled live performances across Europe had to be squeezed in around lockdowns, where the intimate, all-enveloping warmth of their electro-acoustic explorations proved to be a good fit for the fully seated socially-distanced concert settings which proliferated as the world began to open back up. And whenever Waclaw found himself with a day off in London the experiments would continue in Holden’s studio, nudging the pair inevitably towards their next release: the blissful escapism of 2025’s lush “The Universe Will Take Care Of You” album. Embracing a similar playful, experimental approach to that of their Krautrock forefathers, the new album sees both virtuosos encouraged and empowered to reach out beyond the instruments with which they made their name. Thus, Holden supplements his bespoke computer and modular synth systems with his long-neglected childhood violin and his more recently cobbled together collection of hand percussion, whilst on some songs Zimpel forgoes his alto clarinet altogether in favour of electric piano, organ, lap steel guitar, airless harmonium and the Indian twin pipe algoza flute.  

Ultimately it is around a shared love of all things hypnotic and trancey where Holden and Zimpel’s paths converge. Trance is the common thread which runs through their musical predilections, as heard in traditional folk forms the world over, twentieth century minimalism, the Krautrock experiments of the seventies, electronic dance music and improvised jazz alike, and their music exists at the point where all of this good stuff collides. You are invited to join them in trance space. 

Presented by NCH