eight duos

“While Beins belongs to numerous working projects, including Polwechsel, Marmalsana, Sawt Out, and Splitter Orchestra, he’s always been active in the sort of ad hoc collaborations that define the life of an improvising musician, so the eight duets recorded for the album nicely reflect that aspect of his practice in Berlin, where all of the participants live. But in a more profound sense, the triple album does a fantastic job at painting a rather expansive portrait of his overlapping sound worlds. That’s not to say that every facet of his work is represented here, but the kind of sounds he makes are covered in wildly divergent contexts across these six sides of vinyl. (…) Few individuals have expanded on the sort of lowercase sound aesthetic that Beins himself helped forge decades ago, transforming and developing countless techniques into new worlds on sonic inquiry. Each duo draws out different sides of his work, whether that involves him turning to electronics or even electric bass, or using very reduced tools, like the amplified cymbal and bass drum he limits himself to.”
—Peter Margasak, Nowhere Street

Credits

Burkhard Beins percussions, analog synthesizers, samples, objects, bass guitar, electronics

with

Axel Dörner trumpet
Tony Elieh bass guitar, electronics
Andrea Ermke mini discs, samples
Andrea Neumann inside piano, mixing board
Michael Renkel strings, percussion
Quentin Tolimieri grand piano
Anaïs Tuerlinckx grand piano
Marta Zapparoli antennas, receivers, tape machines

LP1 A
Expansion 19:55
Lidingö
Andrea Neumann inside piano, mixing board
Burkhard Beins amplified cymbal, bass drum

LP1 B 
Extraction 07:53
Activity Center
Michael Renkel strings, percussion
Burkhard Beins percussion, strings

Excursion 11:50
Quentin Tolimieri grand piano
Burkhard Beins drums

LP 2 A
Unleash 10:50
Andrea Ermke mini discs, samples
Burkhard Beins analog synthesizers, samples

Unfold 08:22
Anaïs Tuerlinckx grand piano
Burkhard Beins percussion

LP 2 B
Unlock 18:23
Axel Dörner trumpet
Burkhard Beins snare drum, objects

LP 3 A
Transformation 20:58
Zone Null
Tony Elieh bass guitar, electronics
Burkhard Beins bass guitar, electronics

LP 3 B
Transmission 18:53
Vertigo Transport
Marta Zapparoli antennas, receivers, tape machines
Burkhard Beins analog synthesizers, walkie talkies, samples

All material recorded by Rabih Beaini in March & April 2023 at Morphine Raum, Berlin
Mixed and edited by Burkhard Beins
Vinyl master by Andreas LUPO Lubich

Liner notes by Rigobert Dittmann
English translation by Patrick B. Kremer

Portrait photography by Carina Khorkhordina
Artwork by Teresa Iten
nvnc-lp053/55

Audio excerpts

Reviews

Jazz Word, June–August 2025

Only a vanity project if designed that way, multiple recordings from a single artist can offer more than collating obscure or famous souvenirs of a storied career or celebrating a brace of hits. When it comes to creative music multiple discs give the creator more space to showcase original music in one package and a chance for the listener to hear in complete detail perspectives the individual innovator wishes to present.

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The Free Jazz Collective, 2025

This three-LP set is a dive into a substantial body of work – 1 hour, 57 minutes and 29 seconds – drawn from performances at Morphine Raum in Berlin in March and April 2023. Each of the eight duos is represented by a single track, ranging in length from 7:59 to 21:08. It might also be a dive into semantics, and how one might describe what Austrian percussionist and composer Burkhard Beins does.

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Beyond the Dust, 9 November 2025

To mark his 60th birthday, in 2024 Ni Vu Ni Connu published – on a triple LP – this outstanding compendium of Burkhard Beins’ duo works with several artists he’s cooperated with over the years. An open-minded, wide-ranging musician, Beins began his journey as a percussionist but has since broadened his instrumental scope well beyond that limiting label. Eight Duos discloses Beins’ array of intentions, showcasing his versatility in the nuances of color and dynamics in improvisation, as well as his transformative skill inside various collaborative settings.

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taz, 22 October 2024

Im ausgehenden 18. Jahrhundert gelang Franz Joseph Haydn ein Coup, den jetzt im angebrochenen 21. Jahrhundert die Klangkünstlerin Andrea Ermke und der Improvisations- und Echtzeitmusiker Burkhard Beins umgekehrt zu landen wissen. Bei Haydn war es in seiner 94. Sinfonie, der mit dem berühmten Paukenschlag, ein plötzlicher Lauschangriff des ganzen Orchesters. Ob als Überraschung oder als Weckruf gedacht, darüber geht die Überlieferung auseinander.

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Spontaneous Music Tribune, 28 January 2025

Last year was full of round birthdays for notable figures in free jazz and improvised music. In these pages, too, we pompously celebrated Evan Parker’s 80th birthday or John Butcher’s 70th. Agustí Fernández and Mats Gustafsson and Ken Vandermark, a decade younger than him, also played the role of celebrated jubilarians.
Also celebrating his round 60th birthday in October 2024 was German multi-instrumentalist Burkhard Beins, a musician of a thousand talents, although less frequently featured on the front pages of non-existent newspapers devoted exclusively to improvised music. The last weekend in October saw a jubilee concert in Berlin, with Luxembourg-based label Ni Vu Ni Connu supplying a triple vinyl containing eight duets the jubilarian made with artists of various provenance.

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Nowhere Street, 21 October 2024

Percussionist Burkhard Beins turns 60 tomorrow, Tuesday, October 22, and he’s celebrating this milestone with an event at Morphine Raum. The evening also celebrates the release of Eight Duos (Ni Vu Ni Connu), with five of those eight partners on hand to to play solo sets. While Beins belongs to numerous working projects, including Polwechsel, Marmalsana, Sawt Out, and Splitter Orchestra, he’s always been active in the sort of ad hoc collaborations that define the life of an improvising musician, so the eight duets recorded for the album nicely reflect that aspect of his practice in Berlin, where all of the participants live.

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Orkesterjournalen, 25 October 2025

Percussionist Burkhard Beins is one of the key improvisers in the movement that began in Berlin in the late 1990s and flew the flag of freedom as Echtzeitmusik. With his playing expanded by electronics, he reacts instantly to his fellow musicians; the sounds are sculpted together. The eight duets on three vinyl records are a long sound essay in which the shifts in each possibility are carefully examined with many associations: sound, percussion, tone, and the boundary between hearing and remembering.

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International Times, 9 November 2024

Eight Duos, like Lower Marsh, is a collection of duets featuring one common performer, only, in this case, it’s German percussionist Burkhard Beins. Percussionist doesn’t begin to cover it: Beins is as at home with analog synths and bass guitars – in fact, anything that makes a noise – as he is with conventional percussion.

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The New York Jazz Record, April 2025

Spread over the course of three LPs, Eight Duos is a heady collection featuring German composer-percussionist Burkhard Beins collaborating with like-minded players who dig deep into freeform-spatial music with shared musical bravado.

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