Where Jazz and Orchestra Meet the Current
Above: Juno-winner Florian Hoefner will perform on Wednesday, November 4 at Desautels Concert Hall. Photo by Tom Cochrane.
The Way of Water brings the Florian Hoefner Jazz Quartet and Manitoba Chamber Orchestra together for an immersive reflection on beauty, memory, and climate.
Jazz Winnipeg is proud to co-present The Way of Water with the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra on Wednesday, November 4 at Desautels Concert Hall — a sweeping collaboration featuring the Florian Hoefner Jazz Quartet with the MCO, conducted by Alexandre Da Costa.
Water moves, remembers, reshapes, and connects. In The Way of Water, it also becomes music.
And water moves through this concert as more than a theme — it becomes a meeting place for jazz, chamber orchestra, improvisation, and the natural world.
Hoefner’s recent work has explored the relationship between music and the environment. His Project Earth work with Iris Trio was described by UK Jazz News as addressing climate change, pollution, habitat degradation, and biodiversity loss, while also giving centre stage to the beauty and wonder found in nature.
A major part of what makes this collaboration so compelling is the quartet itself. Led by JUNO Award-winning pianist and composer Florian Hoefner — praised by The New York Times as a “composer-bandleader of insightful resolve” and a “harmonically daring pianist […] reaching toward new sonic territory” by Downbeat Magazine — the ensemble brings together musicians with deep roots in New York’s contemporary jazz scene.
Above: Florian Hoefner Trio perform ”Winter in June” on CBC in 2020.
Award-winning musician and composer Lucas Pino has performed at some of the world’s most esteemed festivals and venues. As a tenor saxophonist and multi-woodwind player, his unique and lyrical approach make him one of the most in-demand side musicians across generations. He serves as Co-Artistic Director of the Brubeck Jazz Summit.
John Hébert (double bass) is a New Orleans-born, New York-based bassist widely regarded as one of the most versatile and in-demand voices in contemporary jazz. His most recent album, Sounds of Love (2022), pays tribute to the ensemble vision of Charles Mingus, and he performs regularly at New York's Village Vanguard, Smalls, Mezzrow, and leading festivals worldwide.
Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Jay Sawyer is one of the most in-demand rising star drummers in New York City. He has shared the stage with artists including Freddy Cole, John McNeil, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Stefon Harris, Donny McCaslin, Benito Gonzalez, and Shai Maestro.
Together, they bring the kind of sensitivity, improvisational depth, and musical imagination that can make a chamber orchestra collaboration feel alive in the moment.
“I feel like your own artistry is a combination of all the influences you have, coming out in a different combination in your own mind.”
That sense of beauty, urgency, and discovery flows through The Way of Water — a sweeping collaboration where jazz quartet and chamber orchestra move between composition and improvisation, atmosphere and motion, stillness and force.
The concert brings together two connected suites of music: Florian Hoefner’s Into the Aquasphere, with movements including Aerial Rivers, AMOC, and Force of Nature; and music by composer Quinsin Nachoff, including Tides, Sterna Paradisae, and Supercell.
The Way of Water
Presented by Manitoba Chamber Orchestra and Jazz Winnipeg
📍 Desautels Concert Hall, University of Manitoba
📅 Wednesday, November 4
🕢 7:30 PM
🎟 Tickets from $39
Featuring:
Florian Hoefner, piano
Lucas Pino, tenor sax
John Hébert, bass
Jay Sawyer, drums
Manitoba Chamber Orchestra
Alexandre Da Costa, conductor
The Way of Water is a concert co-presented by Jazz Winnipeg and Manitoba Chamber Orchestra (MCO). Subscribe to MCO now, or get individual concert tickets through Showpass or by calling MCO’s Ticketline at (204) 783-7377.
