Nils Landgren - The Moon, The Stars And You (2011)

With “The Moon, the Stars and You“, Landgren was able to fulfil some wishes that he had long been waiting to realise. “For instance, I’ve been keen on doing something together with Richard Galliano for a while, and vice versa.” Galliano’s unmistakable accordion sound, occasionally sounding like a blues harmonica, provides “Moonshadow” and “Moonriver” with completely new musical shades. “The whole project started with Richard and after that I knew I was headed in the right direction,” Landgren says. One by one, famous friends and colleagues joined in; singer Caecilie Norby, who brought along her own song „Angels of Fortune“; Vince Mendoza, who arranged Jimmy Webb’s hymnic “The Moon’s a Harsh Mistress” for the NDR Big Band and Kurt Weill’s “Lost in the Stars” for the Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra”; and Michael Wollny presents his exceptional technical and improvisatory skills on eight tracks as an accompanist. And finally Joao Bosco, one of the greatest singers and composers of the Musica Popula Brasileira, was brought on board. Landgren met him while in Brazil with the NDR Big Band and asked him whether they should work together. “He said straight away that he would probably even have a song for me. It was called “Holofotes” and it also deals with the moon and stars. I loved the song and so we recorded it.”