Monica Akihary
band leader, artist @ BOI AKIH
Guitarist and composer Niels Brouwer and vocalist and lyricist Monica Akihary, the winner of 2023’s Boy Edgar Prize, the most important Dutch award for jazz and improvised music, have formed the heart of the ensemble BOI AKIH since 1997.
For more than twenty years, boundless curiosity has driven BOI AKIH to ever new experiments and discoveries. Starting from guitar and voice, BOI AKIH works on exciting and ground-breaking repertoire that reveals the layering of different musical traditions.
BOI AKIH’s unique sound emerges in the constant interaction between the musicians and the sources from which they draw. This sound, at once unconventional and accessible, always surprisingly new and yet completely recognizable, mixes acoustic sounds and electronic soundscapes with the versatile, warm voice of Monica Akihary, who sometimes sings in English and sometimes in Haruku, the language of her father’s island.
In BOI AKIH’s musical projects, their deep, personal musical explorations result in a harmonious blending of seemingly incompatible sounds, rhythms and tonalities.
- Since Boi Akih’s showcase at Jazzahead in 2007, I have been visiting jazzahead almost every year. It is so nice to be able to meet programmers from international venues and festivals again. It’s great to give a personal up-date to each other in the corridors, over a drink, a lunch, or whatever is convenient. The atmosphere of Jazzahead also makes it possible to meet new programmers and journalists.
BOI AKIH – From and to Infinity Bimhuis from BOI AKIH on Vimeo.