Category: News

In October “Riga Room” presents series of unique concerts of the leading Baltic saxophonist Denis Pashkevich performing together with outstanding Danish musicians – guitarist Christian Frank, bassist Claus Kaarsgaard and drummer Carsten Landors.

On October 4th, the concert will take place at the Rocket Bean Roastery, at 29/31 Miera Street, Riga, and will be a retrospective of previous years of musicians co-operation. The concert will feature compositions from the jointly released albums “Outlook,” “Close” and “Yours Faithfully”, which was awarded with the Latvian Music Records annual prize “Golden Microphone 2017” in the category “Best jazz / blues music album”.

On October 5th, Denis Pashkevich, Christian Frank, Claus Kaarsgaard and Carsten Landors will perform in the restaurant “32.augusts”, at Sēļu street 12, in Marupe, and present the program called “Frank & Pashkevich Quartet” Meets Jazz Classics. That means that audience will have the opportunity to enjoy the world-famous jazz standards in the original interpretations of these musicians.

On October 6th, in the newly opened art space “Freska”, the unique event will be presented. Musicians will perform unheard songs from the new upcoming album, which will be recorded this November in studio in Denmark. During the concert solo exhibition of the painter Arnis Jansons “The Happiness Code” will be displayed. Moreover, audience will witness art happening performed by Agija Jansone, who will paint in front of the audience under music impression. At the end of the concert the masterpiece created by Agija with her and musicians autographs will be offered for sale.

Musicians met in 2010 during music seminar in Copenhagen. They decided to collaborate and after several concerts they released their debut album “Outlook”. Two years later came out their second album “Close. In 2016 they formed quintet with world famous pianist Aaron Parks (USA) and released album “Yours Faithfully”, which won Latvian Grammy 2017 as the best Blues & Jazz album. Original compositions by Deniss & Christian are mostly atmospheric ballads full of calm and relaxing sophisticated jazz vibes, saturated with intimacy and hint of melancholy. It is a fusion of Nordic laconicism and a wide range of jazz styles. 

Line-up: Deniss Pashkevich (composer/tenor saxophone), Christian Frank (composer/guitar), Claus Kaarsgaard (double bass), Karsten Landors (drums)

The single  “Listen To The Way That I Breathe” is selected for the international song competition “Eurovision 2019” Pre-Selection show “Supernova 2019” semi-finals.

The story of a video (and song) is about the loneliness, struggle and the inner demons of a musician, looking for a support from the others and a hope in general. Every upcoming performance is an emotional challenge for a musician, but the band is always there for the support.

The video was shoot in different places including “K.K. fon Stricka villa”, “Buratino theater”, “GM Pool”,” Ziemeļblāzma Castle”.

“The shooting of a video was quite challenging because you really had to get over yourself emotionally and physically. First, we had to film in a cold weather outside. After that we had to film under the water. With the lack of sleep from the previous night’s gig, that really did took an energy from us” Guntis recalls.

Laika Upe is a five – piece band from Riga, Latvia. Their uniqueness and sound can be found both in their records and in their energetic live performances that no listener can ignore. Since the formation of the band in 2016, Laika Upe has released two singles. The first single “Debess Puses” was released in the summer of 2018.

The second single “Listen To The Way That I Breathe”  is selected for the international song competition “Eurovision 2019” Pre-Selection show “Supernova 2019” semi-finals. The band will perform in the second “Supernova 2019” semi-finals show that will go on air on the second of february on the channel “LTV1”. The show starts at 9.25 PM.

The song “Listen To The Way That I Breathe” can be found on the biggest music streaming services including Spotify, Google Play, iTunes.

One of the hottest new acts from Baltic states Neon Saturdays have returned this autumn with their new single “Phoenix”. The song is loaded with warm summer vibes and will definitely find favor with those who already dread the cold and windy days ahead. And yet there’s so much more to this new tune by the promising Latvian four-piece.

The single was released world-wide on September 25th.  “We had a lot of time to contemplate and discuss issues of human nature, social dynamics and above all – the importance of love, while going through the creative process,” commented the leader of the band Andris Evelis.

“All of this reminded us that our ambitions and actions are primarily guided by our need to be loved – to be safe in the knowledge that the missing piece of the puzzle is not really missing,” said Edvins Rakickis who wrote the lyrics for the song.

While the song speaks about struggle to find happiness in the modern world, plagued by social polarization, the music video takes us through a day in the lives of two girls who fall in love.

“Playing around the myth of the phoenix seemed appropriate here. Thus, we did a modern take on it in the music video. It was clear from the start that we needed actors who would play a couple to tell this story visually and I insisted that we portray a female couple because I felt that feminine energy had to dominate in this story,” said Rakickis.

“Since we chose to portray a same sex couple it was important for us to concentrate on the romantic aspects of this relationship in the video. I think that one of the central errors of homophobia is the perception that it is mainly sexual desire that drives people forward while in reality love and need to be valued and accepted is the reason all of us do most things in life,” added Martins Rudzitis.

The song was recorded and produced together with Scottish production genius Lewis Gardiner who has been working with the band for some time now.

Gardiner had previously made a name for himself working with Ellie Goulding and the winner of 2016 British X Factor Matt Terry.

Talented and well-known sound engineer Andy “Hippy” Baldwin from Metropolis studios was recruited to lay on some finishing touches. Baldwin has previously worked with acts like Oasis, Robbie Williams and The Who.

The band has also announced that the third single together with their second full-length album titled Freaks In The Ocean will be released in November 9th.

Their previous single “Get Up” was released back in April and found its way to numerous radio stations in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, UK and Baltics.

The band released their debut album in 2012. Since then a number of singles, made it to the TOP10 of the biggest Baltic radio stations after which Neon Saturdays toured the Baltic states as well as UK a couple of times.

In 2015 Neon Saturdays was one of the first Latvian acts to play The Great Escape in UK. In 2016 the band opened for the British rock band James.

In July 2018 the band opened for the American singer LP (Laura Pergolizzi) in Latvia, playing for 4000 people.

Band’s music has also received a well-deserved recognition by Tim Fraser, an internationally well-known songwriter (Tina Turner, Billie Myers), partner of Artists United and a member of BASCA’s Songwriters Executive Committee.

The classical music hooligans DAGAMBA as a special st. Valentine’s day greeting has released a new video version for the piece Romeo & Juliet. This is the second single from their upcoming album and grand concert DAGAMBA feat TCHAIKOVSKY taking place 12th of April this year in Arena Riga.

The inspirational spark for the Romeo & Juliet was taken from Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s symphonic poem and its love theme with the same name. Infused with DAGAMBAS original music the piece slowly evolves from lyrical radiance into energetic explosion of emotions.

The composer and DAGAMBA leader Valters Puce explains – this piece is unique, because for the first time each band member has their own solo part or as one could say their own individual interpretation for love. Music is nothing more than pure love in its core; it is love towards your own music instrument – your main tool to bring emotions alive in others as well as in ourselves. DAGAMBA enjoys doing usual things in an unusual way; therefor we want to show you that love is not only fragile, but can also be monumental and suggestive.  

The video version of Romeo and Juliet has been filmed during the recording of the new album in “Sound Division” recording studio by videographer – Karlis Kempels. The album presentation DAGAMBA feat TCHAIKOVSKY will take place at the end of the march.

As announced earlier on 12th of April the classical music hooligans DAGAMBA will have their most ambitious Live Performance in Arena Riga. Tickets are available at “Biļešu serviss”.

Janis Jacmenkins a.k.a JJ LUSH is a young Latvian producer who has just released his debut single “Head high” collaborating with well known Latvian musician Justs. Jānis not only produced music, but also wrote lyrics for this song.

“The main idea of the “Head High” is braking the self-imposed limits. Every one of us creates a thousand stories in our heads about what we could do, become and acheive, however the stories never come true as we are always afraid of failure. This song symbolises my own break-out as a producer not only as a piano player or session musician.”

The author of the single and musician Justs have collaborated before, when both of them stepped on the same stage as well as studied in the Jazeps Vitols Latvian Academy of Music.

Latvian DJ and music producer Makree in collaboration with the acclaimed British producer Secondcity has released the single “Never Been in Love”. This is the first out of three songs to be issued under the record label “Ministry of Sound” and BBC Radio1’s Danny Howard’s  label “Nothing Else Matters” . Both of these record labels are owned by Sony UK and are the world’s leading dance music publishers. The public premieres of “Never Been in Love” took place on March 2 at the BBC Radio 1 during the broadcast of the legendary dance music reviewer Annie Mac, but before its official release it was played already on the sets of such world-class DJs as Grammy-nominated Disclosure, Claptone, Danny Howard and Oliver Helden.

““Ministry of Sound” undeniably is the world’s largest dance music record label that works with various Grammy-nominated artists – being part of this giant dance music organizations is an indescribable feeling, especially since my music is played by DJs and music producers who’s music I’ve followed for years, “says Makree. “Cooperation with the Ministry of Sound at the moment is the most significant achievement of my career, but I consider it only as the beginning – with my work I want to bring Latvian dance music to a new level”.

Makree is a 22 year old electronic dance music DJ and producer, in Latvia he has worked with such artists as Dons, Dvīnes, Justs, Aminata and Pyor. Makree’s international debut was in 2014, when in collaboration with Swedish record label “Metron Music” the song “Clouds” was released. The song “Never Been in Love”  was created in collaboration with the British DJ Secondcity whose single “I Wanna Feel” in May 2014 ranked  as nr. 1 in the UK singles chart and also had the first place in the American Billboard Dance Music Top.

Latvian pop-act Markus Riva collaborates with the fan engagement platform Fanvestory to share his exclusive content, merchandise and a part of his future royalty earnings with his biggest fans and supporters.

Many artists are trying to find new ways to attract fans, but more importantly connect with them as streaming and digitalization has taken away one approach for artists to deeply engage with their biggest fans as they can just scroll through Spotify and find the next artist to listen to within 1 second. Exclusivity is disappearing and that is why Markus Riva has decided to take his fan engagement to the next level with Fanvestory.

“I have been attracted to music since the age of three. I am mostly inspired by my friends and the surrounding environment, but of course also by some heartbreaks and rough times I have gone through. I am lucky to be pursuing my dream in playing, performing and creating songs. There is nothing else I’d rather do and I would not be able to do it without my fanbase. I have decided to work with Fanvestory to show gratitude to my coolest fans and share part of my future earnings with them,” says the Latvian pop singer Markus Riva.

“We decided to work with Markus Riva, because there is no doubt he is a natural talent with big international fanbase and growth potential as he has fans from Russia, the Baltic States, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and other countries. His creations includes many radio singles that have been #1 songs on the charts of iTunes and radio stations,” adds the CEO of Fanvestory Birgit Karus.

Markus Riva new single “Please don’t give up” , that is given out in collaboration with Fanvestory, was written in London but recorded in Riga with Kaspars Ansons – producer that stands behind previously released track “This Time”, also known as “Supernova 2018” entry. “The idea of the song came into my mind when I was in London last year. I woke up in the morning in Shoreditch district, took a shower, and I had this melody in my mind that I fixed with the guitar that was in a hotel room. I love that kind of moments when you give a birth to a song in those unexpected moments”, says Markus. You will hear a lot of “that kind of moments” in new music album by Markus Riva that is set to be released on 20th of September. It is going to be 5th album in Markus Riva’s career that consists of songs written and inspired by real life moments. The title of the new album is going to be “I CAN” because it symbolises the life of Markus Riva – “with this album I want to inspire people. The title song I wrote for my mother when she was struggling with cancer, unfortunately I lost her last year and it was a a hard time, but good to create and find myself again in music”.

Fanvestory is a fan-engagement technology platform, which allows music fans to support artists and receive exclusive content, merchandise and a small percentage of future royalties from their favourite artists in return. So far, Fanvestory has worked with popular artists like Tommy Cash, Justs and Tanel Padar and is now collaborating with Latvian pop singer and X factor host Markus Riva.

This years’ Summer Sound festival will offer a chance to watch local cinema to its attendees in just two weeks – 3rd and 4th of August.

The cinema tent has found its way back to Summer Sound festival. In it, during the whole of the festival, there will be screenings of classic and modern Latvian cinema pieces, as well as student films. The list of films includes Four white shirts, My friend – a quirky man, Thumbelin, Emīls’ mischiefs, Because of that crazy Paulīne, Soloist needed, Return of Sgt Lapiņš, Butter, short films from students of Latvian Academy of Culture and others.

Speaking of films chosen for cinema tent of Summer Sound is curator of the tent Agnese Logina:” We know well that people are not attending the festival purely for the cinema, but we wish to broaden the spectrum of experience for the attendees. This year the cinema tent will give a chance to get to know different generations of Latvian cinema. For some this might mean watching the Latvian classics for the first time, for some it might be a revisiting of those, but the cinema tent is going to be a place for rejuvenation, good mood, laughter and new findings. The cinema tent is going to screen the classics and also more recent films, especially suited for families with kids, but all of the films are going to be life-affirming pieces motivating contemplation through laughter.”

This year the festival also invites you to attend warm-up concerts for the festival that are going to take place in Liepaja the whole week through – in Petermarket, at Liepaja University and Julianna’s court in July 31st, August 1st and August 2nd. On the City stage 15 local musicians and DJs, including Liepaja inhabitants, will perform. The three stages will host The Coconuts, Mārtiņš Dambis & Co, NiklāvZ, Funky DJ Elegant, The Mary Jane and others. Entrance is free of charge.

The most recent news of Summer Sound festival and the City stage program can be checked out at the Summer Sound official app, downloaded within Google Play Store and Appstore.

Up until now these artists have been announced for this years’ Summer Sound festival – American rockband Goo Goo Dolls, the British rockband Coasts, German DJ Alle Farben, the local Musiqq, Aija Andrejeva, Labvēlīgais Tips, Dzelzs Vilks, Pienvedēja Piedzīvojumi, Rīgas Modes, Igo, Justs, Sudden Lights, Marta Ritova, Astra The 22’s, Rigga Reggae, Singapūras Satīns, rappers Ansis, Edavārdi and Fakts, DJs Toms Grēviņš and Makree, bands Čipsis un Dullais, Inokentijs Mārpls, Soundarcade, Židrūns, The Bongo Club, The Bad Tones, Múr, Buchares, PODRUGA, DJ Uldis Rudaks.

Lithuania-based musician Andis Grīva with his band – Andis Grīva is WWMM, Lithuanian Colours of Bubbles, Garbanotas Bosistas and Antikvariniai Kašpirovskio dantys.

In year 2018, Summer Sound will take place for the 8th time, and has undoubtedly become one of the most important music events of the Baltic summer. That is confirmed by the thousands of attendees that come each year to the wonderful beach of Liepāja to enjoy musical entertainment and relaxation by the seaside for two whole days. Each year, the festival offers more than 50 artists, as well as providing a menu of various entertaining activities.

Summer Sound is supported by Liepāja city, you are kindly invited by A/S Aldaris, and the festival is reccomended by the official radio of the festival – Radio SWH.

Good news – Latvian music is taking over the top spots in Lithuania’s radios! In the 1st place this week is K. Ansons’, V.Sprudzs’, K.Praulina’s and Jurga’s song “Be Žodžių” on FM99 in Alytas, English version of this song is  “(My Heart Beats) Staccato”, which was co-written by Kaspars Ansons, Kristīne Prauliņa and Valters Sprūdžs, this is one of the songs which were created during the fall session of the songwriting workshop “RIGaLIVE”. 

Don’t forget to catch Carnival Youth live this week in Lithuania – today at Loftas in Vilnius, and tomorrow in Alytas city festival.

How Town is a Belgian-Latvian band led by bass player/composer Lennart Heyndels. Their music is not easily classified, jumping from the more experimental corner of improvisation to a spontaneity and flexibility clearly rooted in jazz, they bring well worked out compositions taking inspiration from a pop, folk and singer-songwriter tradition. Since its beginnings in 2012, the band has released three albums: How Town (2013), a suite based on the E.E. Cummings poem ‘Anyone lived in a pretty how town’, No marvel (that I mistake my view) (2014) and I dare you sea (2016).

“I want to watch a tree grow” (2018) is How Town’s fourth album and definitely their most eclectic one. Consisting of compositions by all members of the band, the album has lyrics in four different languages (Russian, English, Latvian and French). Choral harmonies meet twisted bass grooves and sharp guitar sounds, before unnoticeably transforming into folk songs you might as well be whistling on your bike. Before you know it you find yourself in the middle of a compelling ballad with the rhythmic pulse of a ping pong ball and you may ask yourself: “How did I get here?”. A question which will become more and more irrelevant as you join How Town in watching their tree grow.

How Town has performed all over Europe including The Netherlands, France, Germany, Slovenia, Austria, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Belgium. They played at major festivals like Jazz International Rotterdam, Match & Fuse London and Theater Aan Zee and at concert venues like Bimhuis, Porgy & Bess and Stadtgarten. The band has won several prizes among which the Keep An Eye ‘The Records’ award (2017) and the Jong Muziek prize at Theater Aan Zee (2014).