Following his 2018 debut ‘Passengers’ (launched at Amsterdam’s legendary Bimhuis), Kraaijeveld has spent the last few years honing his craft in front of live audiences. As a ‘schooled’ jazz musician who nonetheless prefers mystery over mastery, he brings together compelling music with poetic lyrics, storytellingand surprising improvisations. 

Playful and light-footed music alternates with intense vivacious grooves and harmonies which bring to mind self-proclaimed influences like Sting, Bobby McFerrin and Esperanza Spalding. There are laid-back bluesy numbers, an energetic vocal interpretation of Wayne Shorter’s Adam’s Apple , a 43-second whistlestop version of Milestones and even a melancholic reworking of a Nick Drake classic. 

Yet it’s personal storytelling which shines through. “I am fascinated by our human need to be able to be vulnerable and to be loved with all our potential and flaws” he comments. “The album therefore comes from a place of openness where I explore the mysteries and paradoxes of life.”

At the other end, playfulness is important to him in a modern jazz world that “can at times be overly serious”. Henk doesn’t shy away from a wink at the world of online dating in Commonly Unique Individual Casualness and ends with an almost childlike fable where a mole expresses his desire to fly to the moon.

Offering up honesty, vulnerability and humor in equal measure, he’s backed by an ‘all-star’ quintet which features some of the most sought after creative and energetic musicians from the Netherlands; Daan Herweg on piano, Tobias Nijboer on double bass, Roberto Pistolesi on drums and saxophonist Paul van der Feen.

It’s music for dreamers, wanderers and realists that enjoy mischievous sparks of light, as patches of sky that connect us.

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