Nik Bärtsch’s RONIN

Ritual groove music at the intersection of funk, minimal, and jazz by a remarkable Swiss band.

Since 2001, Ronin has been the missing link between minimal music, jazz, zen meditation, and Eastern martial arts. With utmost precision, Swiss pianist Nik Bärtsch has built a consistent oeuvre, with well-received albums on ECM Records. Using 'modules', numbered compositions, he constructs a fine-meshed structure where surprising rhythms and grooves emerge. The tight execution draws comparisons to minimal techno and electronic music.

Over the years, Ronin has had only a few personnel changes. The newest member is Jeremias Keller on bass, alongside Sha on bass clarinet and contrabass clarinet and Kaspar Rast on drums. Their latest album SPIN, released on Ronin Rhythm Records, marks more than twenty years of weekly playing: in January 2024, the thousandth concert took place in their own club EXIL in Zürich, a milestone also audible in the music.

‘The music of Ronin, named after a samurai warrior without a clan, can change like a kaleidoscope of style and atmosphere. In a seamlessly connected collection of numbers, which bear no names but are numbered modules, it transitions in an intensely thought-out show from minimal music with repetitive rhythmic patterns to full peaks of funk’ (NRC).

Nik Bärtsch piano, Sha bass clarinet/contrabass clarinet, Jeremias Keller double bass, Kaspar Rast drums