Exit the cinema

The venerable cinema in Kongsberg has hosted its last concert. Saturday's concert with the Joe Lovano Quartet was the end of an important era in Kongsberg Jazz Festival's history. Next year, Krona will take over on the West side.

The jazz audience can associate many good memories with this concert arena. Celebrities such as Dizzy Gillespie, Chick Corea, Terje Rypdal and Matias Eick have visited the cinema.

Bass player Arild Andersen is one of those who have had the most concerts in Kongsberg Kino. He can tell that already in the 90s he received a plaque marking that he had given 30 concerts there. He has since lost track of how many there have been. Just before he went on stage with Christian Meaas Svendsen, we had a little chat about what the cinema has meant to him.

He has had many good experiences in the cinema. As an artist, he particularly remembers a double bass concert that he was supposed to give with Nils Henning Ørsted Pedersen in 1994. When Pedersen had to cancel right before the concert, the American Mark Johnson, who was at the jazz festival with another band, took up the challenge and stepped in short notice. The two bassists only had half an hour to practice, but the concert was a great experience.

In recent years, Arild Andersen has been almost regular at the cinema's "five performances" on Jazz Saturday. For him, the cinema has worked very well as a concert venue. - It is a place that accommodated many people but where I have felt close to the audience at the same time. It has also been easy to get a good sound there, he says. He has nothing to complain about. On the contrary, he has been very satisfied, but says that it was a long-awaited upgrade when a door was made at the back of the stage with stairs up from the car park, so that it was easier to bring instruments and equipment in and out.

There have been many legendary concerts in the cinema. Some of these are fixed on film rolls and on discs. An example is NRK's ​​classic concert recording with Chet Baker. Arild Andersen has also been diligent as an audience member and remembers well the concert which was a milestone in the singer and composer Radka Toneff's short career. That was in 1977 and unfortunately we lost this great Norwegian talent already in 1982. Another good concert memory he will highlight is Sony Rollins, Bobo Stenson and Jon Christensen in 1971.

Kongsberg cinema was built in 1965, and designed by the architectural firm Ljøterud og Ødegård. This is a signal building for both the city and jazz. Kongsberg cinema was a controversial building when it was opened in December 1965. It still is, both in the local and national press, so it will be exciting to see what happens to the building in the future.

Text: Astrid Berdal / Photo: Ron Jansen