Swiss bassist Bänz Oester is a phenomenal player in all respects – technique, originality, sound, musicality – but the compliment could be applied to the entire European/Africa quartet that he leads. This collaboration emerged out of Oester’s first tour to Makhanda (in 2011) and has taken on a significant life of its own, with the band regularly touring Europe and South Africa and releasing stunning recordings. The musicians not only play their instrument, they ARE the instrument itself; they are the sound, fully present in the now, generating pure joy and together they create a sound that seems to influence the universe. In the tradition of Coltrane’s spirituality, they give us this ancient religion, not as superstitious bigotry, but as what binds us back together, a precious sense of human belonging, brotherhood and sisterhood.