Fri 19.8. | 23:15 @ Flow Live
A soul singer with a distinctive style and voice, Omar is a true British soul icon. And since it’s already been 15 years since his first hit, “There’s Nothing Like This,” he's something of a veteran as well. Flow05 is happy to host Omar’s very first performance in Finland.
Currently working on his sixth album (set for release later this year), Omar has always followed his own vision throughout his career. His music is an elegant hybrid of soul, R&B, jazz, and disco combined with lush orchestrations and superb songwriting†in the best soul traditions. It is no wonder that artists like D’Angelo, Jill Scott, and Maxwell have cited Omar as a major influence on their music.
Omar has also worked with Stevie Wonder, Lamont Dozier of the legendary Holland-Dozier-Holland songwriting trio, and Marvin Gaye’s arranger and singer Leon Ware. His forthcoming album features guest appearances by Common, with whom he will undertake an extensive US tour next autumn, and Stevie Wonder, who has also composed some of the music. Erykah Badu and Angie Stone appeared on his last album, Best By Far.
“When I grow up I wanna be like Omar.” —Stevie Wonder
“Omar is one of my favourite artists ever.” —Erykah Badu
Sat 20.8. | 21:00 @ Yard of Makasiinit
JazzCotech Dancers were founded by Perry Louis, an established dancer on the club jazz and funk dance circuits. JazzCotech can be billed as the busiest and most versatile jazz dance group in the UK. Their shows are explosive, full of passion and energy which always keeps the audience shouting for more.
JazzCotech Dancers have appeared at all the major international jazz and music festivals including Montreux, North Sea Jazz, Phoenix, and Glastonbury. The group has danced with numerous jazz and funk bands and they have supported well-known artists such as James Brown, Maceo Parker, Jamiroquai, Wynton Marsalis, and Jon Hendricks, to name but a few. The group runs numerous promotions in London, and are constantly approached by promoters, DJs, club owners, and musicians to assist them on various projects.
Sat 20.8. | 24:00 @ Flow Live
Marva Whitney is one of the toughest female soul singers ever. Her powerful and instantly recognizable voice and gutsy delivery made her an integral part of the James Brown Revue in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, alongside Hank Ballard, Bobby Byrd and Vicki Anderson.
Marva Whitney’s musical roots are in gospel. Born and raised in Kansas City, she studied music and performed as the lead singer of R&B group Tommy Gadson & The Derbys. When she caught the attention of James Brown in 1967, she was instantly signed to King Records, Brown’s label at the time.
During the following years she recorded two albums for King, It’s My Thing (1969) and Live And Lowdown At The Apollo (1970). Both of them are considered one of the finest examples of an era when funk music started colliding with classic soul, recorded at a crucial period in the development of rhythm music. She has released nearly 20 singles, of which the best known are It’s My Thing, an answer song to the famous Isley Brother hit, and Things Got To Get Better.
Whitney’s recording career slowed down during the 1970’s, but she is still an active performer. While Marva Whitney never really crossed-over to the pop charts, her best material is monumental not only in the minds of music aficionados. Major hiphop artists like Public Enemy, EPMD and NWA found Marva Whitney’s music in the late 1980’s, when sampling became the norm in hiphop production.
Fri 19.8. | 01:00 @ Flow Live
Rarely will you find a talent whose vision supersedes the boundaries of genre until you have met King Britt. This Philadelphia native has found a way to escape the boundaries of a single category of music by expressing his creations through deep house, hip hop, broken beat, nu-jazz, funk, and afro-tech.
As a remix producer, King has flipped and funked everyone from Macy Gray and Tori Amos to Yoko Ono and Femi Kuti. His recent remix of breakthrough artist Josh One's “Contemplation (5.1 Entertainment)” was nominated for the Dancestar Remix of the Year award (2002), alongside remixes by Danny Tenaglia and Basement Jaxx, placing him in the ranks of the top notch, most sought after remixers in the world. Never one to hog the spotlight, he recently collaborated with Nigerian born producer Oba Funke to create Cosmo Afrique (Karma Giraffe), an LP of original afro-tech productions that features the vocal stylings of Soul II Soul's Wumni, Zap Mama, and Diva Blue and is an exploration of polyrhythmic beats, chants, and tribal grooves.
At Flow05 King will perform the world premiere live band show of his tribute to the late Afro-American folk artist Sister Gertrude Morgan. The “King Britt Presents: Sister Gertrude Morgan” show is an audio visual tour through the art and music of Sister Gertrude Morgan, an influential African American folk artist who influenced New Orleans in the mid-1900s. Morgan (1900-1980) was a visual artist and also a singer whose idiosyncratic songs have been arranged by King Britt for a five-man band. The King Britt presents Sister Gertrude Morgan album will be released in September 2005 on Rope-A-Dope records.
Sat 20.8. | 21:30 @ Flow Live
The first ever joint live performance of a true jazz legend and the much hyped FCQ! The Five Corners Quintet is a Helsinki-based post modern jazz outfit influenced by early sixties straight ahead and Latin jazz and led by producer Tuomas Kallio, The Five Corners Quintet is a new extension of the acclaimed Nuspirit Helsinki collective.
The two innovators behind The Five Corners Quintet—composer, producer, and arranger Tuomas Kallio and benevolent svengali and record label manager Antti Eerikäinen initially set out to release a few 12” singles of stylish jazz music tailored for the dance floor. As the first three vinyl single releases received a huge response among press and taste makers, the casual project slowly evolved into a live band and an album project.
In the studio The Five Corners Quintet is a contemporary project crossing from the analogue to the digital domain, drawing on tools from tape recorders to samplers and sequencers. Performing live is another story. At times a sextet or even bigger, the live band consists of the very cream of the Finnish jazzmen. Eero Koivistoinen is a tenor sax heavyweight who has been around since the sixties. Jukka Eskola is a young trumpet phenomenon and the Finnish equivalent of Freddie Hubbard. Severi Pyysalo, on vibes, is a Blue Note recording artist and the drummer Teppo Mäkynen, voted the number 1 drummer by the Finnish jazz press year after year, is internationally known from Nuspirit Helsinki and his solo project Teddy Rok Seven. The group’s debut album “Chasin The Jazz Gone By” is released summer/autumn of 2005.
The album and the Flow05 live show feature two world-class guest vocalists, the other one being none other than the 7 time Grammy nominee, “Jazz singers’ jazz singer”, Mr. Mark Murphy. The female voice on the album is Paris-based Okou who is a versatile vocalist and has been working with a lot of different kind of talents from Mick Jagger to Keziah Jones.
The Five Corners Quintet is honoured to perform live with two world-renowned vocalists as Mark Murphy and Okou. This promises to be a jazz event not to be missed!
Sat 20.8. | 22:30 @ Flow Live
Seven-time Grammy nominee and four-time Downbeat Magazine Readers’ Poll winner for best jazz vocal performance Mark Murphy is one of the world's greatest -- and hippest -- jazz vocalists performing today.
With a coterie of fans including tap dancer Gregory Hines, legendary composer Alec Wilder, and vocal greats Betty Carter, Peggy Lee, Cleo Laine, Shirley Horn, and Ella Fitzgerald, Mark Murphy has enjoyed a prolific 40-year recording career, with over 40 releases to date. His original lyrics to “Stolen Moments,” “Red Clay,” and others are known the world over. His innovative projects range from the work of Nat 'King' Cole to Jack Kerouac to Ivan Lins to Eddie Jefferson. Stereo Review dubs Mark 'one of the major artists of our age.
Dubbed 'a hipster's hipster' by the New York Post, Mark Murphy returned to New York in the early '60s and made the now classic jazz recording “Rah” on the Riverside label (recently reissued by Fantasy Records), featuring legendary jazz players Bill Evans, Clark Terry, Urbie Green, Blue Mitchell, and Wynton Kelly. Mark's favorite recording to date, “That's How I Love the Blues,” soon followed. In 1963, Murphy hit the charts across the country with his single “Fly Me To the Moon” and was voted New Star of the Year in Downbeat's Reader's Poll.
Murphy continues to tour internationally year round, appearing at festivals, concerts, in the best jazz clubs and on television programs throughout the U.S., Europe, Australia, and Japan. He is one of the most important, and yes, hippest, jazz vocalists of our time. His secret? 'There's a party goin' on in Mark's head,' declares fan Liza Minelli, 'and I want to go to it!'
Fri 19.8. | 21:30 @ Flow Live
Husky Rescue is a project lead by producer/composer Marko Nyberg. The outfit lands somewhere between the cinematics of Pink Floyd and the modern sensibilities of The Bees. You may have heard Marko Nyberg’s sound before without even realising it since he was heavily involved with the mixing and recording of Pepe DeluxÈ’s Beatitude.
In 2001 Marko built his own studio, codenamed Elcamino Helsinki, in the middle of the Finnish capital to serve as a place where he could craft the ideas that would become Husky Rescue. “The way I work with my music is comparable to the techniques a graphic designer would employ,” says Marko. “I use collage techniques. After recording material for the songs, I build up textures that best suit the feeling and the visual mindscape to, hopefully, relate what I want to express.”
Husky Rescue releases so far include the highly acclaimed singles “Summertime Cowboy” and “New Light Of Tomorrow”, which DJ Magazine described as “some of the best, most heartfelt music you'll hear this year.” Mixmag called it “an EP of chilled, darkened-room gems.” The debut album “Country Falls” was released to critical acclaim and was followed by a five-piece live band tour over the summer with Morcheeba, as well as appearances at Glastonbury, The Big Chill, and Bestival in the UK.
Husky Rescue will perform a special 10-piece live show for the first time at Flow05.
Fri 19.8. | 00:30 @ Rocking Chair Club
Known as a living encyclopedia of beats, three-time Grammy nominated Kenny Dope is a purveyor of sonic masterpieces. One of the most prolific artists of the modern music age, he has been entertaining and astounding the masses alike with his fusion of house, hip-hop, Latin, jazz, soul, and broken beats.
His biggest commercial success as a solo artist came in 1995, when he took a loop from Chicago’s “Street Player,” added some discreet production touches and The Bucketheads’ classic slice of disco, and “The Bomb (These Sounds Fall Into My Mind)” was born. The single was a major hit in Europe and a full-length album followed in the wake of its success.
Gonzalez and DJ Louie Vega together form the production duo Masters At Work. Their Nuyorican Soul project (1997) brought together some of the greatest talents in Afro- and Latin-American music, from George Benson to Roy Ayers and Tito Puente. The album, with its epic re-workings of Rotary Connection’s “I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun” and Bob James’ “Nautilus,” is already considered a classic. Most recently, Gonzalez has kept himself busy building his Kay-Dee record label together with the UK-based northern soul and funk veteran Keb Darge. The label has put out Gonzalez’s re-edits of forgotten soul and funk gems from artists like Manzel and Johnny King & The Fatback Band.
Kenny Dope’s DJ gigs reflect his versatile musical background. With 20-plus years of experience in making dance music, collecting records,†and deejaying at clubs around the world, it is evident that this man can do no wrong.
Sat 20.8. | 23:30 @ Rocking Chair Club
Brooklyn-born DJ Spinna is known and respected for his versatile production style. He has produced a host of hip hop acts from De La Soul to Das EFX and Mos Def, and has released his own acclaimed albums both as a solo artist and as part of the hip hop group The Jigmastas. As a pop producer Spinna has brought his beat-making skills to popular culture icons Michael Jackson, George Michael, and Shirley Bassey. As a producer of sophisticated electronic dance music, he has collaborated with everyone from 4 Hero to Nightmares On Wax and Les Nubians.
But Spinna is also a DJ in the real sense of the word: he can rock a party anywhere, anytime. An avid record collector since childhood, he has been exposed to different genres of music and knows how to work a club crowd into a frenzy. His DJ sets form a seamless blend of styles from hip hop, breakbeat, R&B, and rare groove to soul, funk, and jazz classics—not to mention disco, garage, and house. So it’s no wonder that he’s had the opportunity to†perform alongside the greatest DJs and play in virtually all†the respected venues in the US and abroad.
DJ Spinna's set at Flow05 will be his first in Finland. Needless to say, it’s been a long wait – but well worth it.
Sat 20.8. | 01:30 @ Rocking Chair Club
A much respected and often emulated DJ, producer, musician, and remixer, Osunlade has quickly made his mark on the international house music scene. Once a presenter on the classic children’s show Sesame Street, Osunlade’s 2001 debut album, Paradigm, was released by UK label Soul Jazz. Praised by critics and loved by fans of soulful house, the album established the then-32-year-old Osunlade as a force to be reckoned with. A mix album, Offering, followed in 2002. Being an ordained priest in the African religion of Ifa has brought a distinctively spiritual sound to Osunlade's music.
Since his start in the music business as a producer in the late 1980's, Osunlade has worked with such industry heavyweights as Patti Labelle and Musiq Soulchild. Osunlade has been recently working on soul singer Eric Benet's album as well as producing for India Arie. He also runs his own record label, Yoruba Records, in Puerto Rico, which releases deep, spiritual house with African influences. On-going projects include working with Lauryn Hill on her highly anticipated comeback album. Osunlade’s DJ performance will be his first ever in Finland.
Fri 19.8. | 23:15 @ Redroom
Inner City is a popular monthly club night in Berlin run by DJ Dixon aka Wahoo (Steffen Berkhan). Inner City of Berlin at Flow05 is the German counterpart to the already legendary Made in Detroit night, featuring Jori Hulkkonen, Ender and Lil’ Tony, that took place for the first time at Flow04. Inner City of Berlin will be hosted by Dixon and Kristian Beyer of the German duo ¬me, who have released a long list of high-profile dance floor burners via the excellent Sonar Kollektiv label. In a four hour-long set on four decks, Dixon and ¬me are set to explore different angles and flavours of the fertile Berlin scene.
Dixon can be described as a deep house DJ who fuses the American deep house/techno style with sophisticated European club music. Besides deejaying, music production, and club management, Steffen also runs a sandwich shop and is now creating a t-shirt line for Sonar Kollektiv records. The first release from his brand new label, Innervisions, is an EP from Tokyo Black Star (Alex from Tokyo) entitled Psycho Dance EP. Kristian Beyer and Frank Wiedemann together form the duo ¬me (pronounced Ahm, which is French for soul). Their soulful mission to explore far beyond the borders of house music has already captured the attention of the present club music scene.
Sat 20.8. | 22:00 @ Redroom
The sound of Made In Detroit can be described as rough but sophisticated old school techno with an attitude. Once a club night in the now-defunct Berlin club, three passionate Detroit techno collectors are resurrecting Helsinki’s one and only pure Detroit techno residency, the infamous Made In Detroit. The resurrection brings together Jori Hulkkonen (F-Communications) and Nuspirit’s Lil’ Tony and Ender, who have all been buying Motor City vinyl for a very long time. Made in Detroit at Flow05 has only one rule: if the label doesn’t mention Detroit, they aren’t allowed to play it. And on this occasion, if it’s not old school techno, they don’t want to play it anyway.
Jori Hulkkonen, currently signed to F Communications, is one of Finland’s most internationally famous DJs, known and respected for his open-minded style as a house producer. The Nuspirit Helsinki DJs Ender and Lil' Tony are long-time contributors to the Finnish club scene, with international exposure around Europe, North America, and Japan.
The DJ booth will be equipped with four decks and two mixers to make sure that the beat goes on throughout the night. Last year’s huge success meant that we had to find a bit bigger venue for this year’s show.
Sat 20.8. | 22:00 @ Rocking Chair Club
DJ Anonymous is one of the key figures of Finnish hiphop and DJ culture. He started out spinning hiphop in clubs in Helsinki as far back as the early 1990’s. Over the years he’s widened his musical spectrum to all kinds of black music from soul to disco, jazz and reggae while always maintaining his hiphop roots.
In 1997, together with long-time partner DJ Didier, DJ Anonymous launched Worldwide, Finland’s best known and most respected hiphop club. In addition to witnessing dozens of Finnish hiphoppers storm the stage, the Worldwide audience has been treated with performances by artists like Common, The Roots, Lootpack and J-Live.
In 2005, Anonymous is keeping busy DJ’ing in clubs and for rap sensation Ruudolf, running his weekly mix show Lauantaityylit on the airwaves of Radio Helsinki and working in Lifesaver Records, a specialist record shop in Viiskulma, Helsinki. DJ Anonymous is an omnipresent name in flyers circulating cities in†Finland†– and one who’s known to be a sure shot party rocker wherever he plays.
Fri 19.8. | 22:00 @ Rocking Chair Club
DJ Didier, along with DJ Anonymous, is a DJ-veteran despite his young age and an important contributor to hiphop in Finland. Although Didier got his start as a hiphop DJ, he’s never been limited to only one style of music.
Didier has run hiphop clubs and done radio shows for years, but he’s also made a name as producer of highly acclaimed records for neo-funksters Calypso King & The Soul Investigators under their various guises, reggae artist Jukka Poika and soul singer Nicole Willis. Currently, Didier is putting finishing touches to Jimi Tenor’s forthcoming album and getting ready to release an EP of hiphop instrumentals as well as broadcasting his weekly Tyylit takaisin radio show on Radio Helsinki.
Didier has the honor of opening the Flow05’s Rocking Chair Club.
Fri 19.8. | 21:00 @ Yard of Makasiinit
Finnish for a waiting room or a state of waiting or expectation, Odotustila is juggler Ville Walo and magician Kalle Hakkarainen's modern circus piece combining inventive forms of the old circus disciplines of juggling and magic with video projection.
New circus can be described as close to dance and theatre. Odotustila is about two men sitting on a bench in a station waiting room. Impatient, slow, intense, frustrated waiting turns into physical movement. In a public space the one who waits is at the same time an observer and a target of observation. The large group of people hides one inside it, but at the same time it perceives, distinguishes, and makes those who wait feel their loneliness. The station is a centre of encounters, coincidences and chance; it is an intersection of different routes. Music accompanies this otherwise mute theatre, which is intense and dreamy.
Odotustila was first performed on 26 April 2003 in the Kiasma theatre, in the Finnish National Gallery, Helsinki Odotustila has since been performed in France, Germany, Spain and Brazil. An abbreviated version will be performed at Flow05.
Sat 20.8. | 12:00 @ Yard of Makasiini
On Saturday afternoon from 12PM to 7:30PM, a record fair, documentary films, music, and a nice selection of food will be on offer in the sunny yard of Makasiinit. There is no age limit and admission is free.
Some of the best record shops in Finland will be stocking the Flow05 record fair with the cream of their selection. But anyone can join in and reserve a table (free of charge) to sell their own records. Advance table reservations can be made by sending an email to info@flowfestival.com before 15 August. Music will be provided by Lifesaver, Club Wahoo, and Straight No Chaser magazine DJs.
The daytime program will also include the first public Helsinki screening of the legendary street culture documentary, Tony Silver's Style Wars. The screening (approximately 70 min) takes place on Saturday, August 20th at the daytime event and starts at 5PM. The documentary will be shown on a giant 40m2 Jumbotron screen in the Makasiinit yard.