Christoph Irniger Pilgrim

The quintet Pilgrim, formed around Zurich tenor saxophonist Christoph Irniger, has matured over the years into one of the most exciting ensembles in young European jazz. In March 2025, they will release their sixth album, Human Intelligence Live, on Intakt Records.

In their music — brilliantly conceived yet generously open — the quintet uses ambiguity as a tool. Some compositions are freely improvised, while others are fully written out, but most lie somewhere in between, with a flexibility that reflects a life full of freedom, where informed decisions are made spontaneously. The accompanying soundtrack oscillates between enigmatic self-reflection and wild eruptions, with the musicians creating a pervasive, full, and dense sound that defies easy categorization.

For Pilgrim, written notes are nothing more than a title, a possible story's theme, or a doorway to another space of musical freedom. No matter which musician picks up a theme, the story is told differently each time. What doesn’t come through in a deliberately controlled process still leaves its mark through subconscious development and maturation. It may reappear with a different quality and become integrated. The fact that this is neither wishful thinking nor cliché is always evident in the surprising turning points within Pilgrim’s music. These ensure that the playing remains vibrant and truly unfolds.

In the liner notes for the current recording, Kevin LeGendre writes: “There is nothing artificial in this music. The band impresses with its strong cohesion and tremendous inventiveness, the result of the growing empathy among the musicians and the precision of each player’s performance.” And Peter Margasak, writing about their previous album Crosswinds, says: “Irniger and his bandmates have developed a rich contemporary sound that combines the ideas of some of America’s great harmonic thinkers with a distinctly European flair.”