Tomas Karlsson

Tomas Karlsson

Tomas Karlsson at Doo-Bop Club in Vaasa, Finland.
Background information
Born (1963-04-26) April 26, 1963
Genres Jazz, latin jazz, jazz fusion, progressive, pop, rock
Occupation(s) musician, teacher, composer/ songwriter/ arranger
Instruments guitar
Years active 1970s– present
Website www.tomaskarlsson.com

Tomas Karlsson (born April 26, 1963) is a Finnish guitarist, teacher and composer/ songwriter/ arranger.

Biography

Tomas lives in Kristiinankaupunki, a very small town on the Finnish west coast. He teaches guitar, electric bass, ukulele, piano, drums, ensemble playing, improvisation, music theory, notation and composition/ songwriting/ arranging at several music schools.

Tomas has a very long musical history spanning over 40 years. He started out playing in the school orchestra and in a small jazz group during his teens and moved on to playing in pop/ rock/ jazz (and even dance) bands and big bands.

Nowadays he mainly plays his own music, which is very eclectic and polystylistic. Some of the genres/ styles represented in his music are meditative ballads, afrojazz, blues, country, funk, jazz, grunge, latin jazz, metal, pop, progressive pop, reggae, samba, even tango…

He is very active as a composer/ songwriter and he has written about 150-200 tunes. He listens mainly to jazz but when he writes music, almost anything can be the result and he always wants to let the tune itself fall into whatever genre/ style it wants to. He mainly writes music for his own use but also for theatre, film, TV and games.

He has studied Jazz Composition and Arranging and Music Composition for Film, TV and Games at Berklee College of Music.

Tomas likes making instrumental music the most because he thinks that the absence of lyrics leaves more to the listener's imagination – everyone can see his/ her own pictures.

Zen Guitar Songs (2015) by Tomas Karlsson. Cover art by Tomi Lepistö.

He has released one CD with original music, Zen Guitar Songs (2015). Currently he works on releasing more music on streaming services and soon there will be a second album.

When recording or performing his own music he relies heavily on guitarist Tom Forsman, bassist Kenneth Nordman, bassist/ guitarist Stefan "Kilju" Lindblom and drummers Stefan Brokvist and Oskar Nilsson. They are top notch pro players and at the same time very good old friends of his.

His CD with original music, Zen Guitar Songs, is available on Spotify and other streaming services.

The music on the Zen Guitar Songs album is written and played in a special open tuning – DADAAD. This tuning is also referred to as the "Zen Guitar" tuning. This is due to the fact that it is the tuning used by Philip Toshio Sudo, who wrote the book Zen Guitar, which has sold over 100.000 copies.

He regularly gives workshops on "Zen Guitar". In the workshops he teaches playing in the DADAAD tuning, plays and jams with the students and shows examples of how to write songs in the DADAAD tuning. Tomas has written a small lesson on using this guitar tuning.

Tomas has also written a very large lesson material on jazz, improvisation and composition/ songwriting. The material consists of hundreds of pages of text and notated music examples and is available for free in the "Lessons" section of his website.

Tomas is also known for having founded the local jazz club Krs Jazz in Kristiinankaupunki in 2008. Tomas has been leading Krs Jazz ever since founding it.

Awards, Grants and Scholarships

Discography

References

  1. "Han lyfter upp sin själ med gitarrspel" Vasabladet 2006-01-15.
  2. "Årets konstnär drömde om ett jazzkafé" Citta! #2/2012.
  3. "Musiikki vei voiton matematiikasta" Suupohjan sanomat 2012.
  4. "Årets konstnär ska lära fler att spela gitarr" Syd-Österbotten 2012.
  5. "Årets konstnär stämmer om" Vasabladet 2012.
  6. "Tomas Karlsson är årets konstnär i Kristinestad" Yle Nyheter-Österbotten 2012.
  7. "Jazz-mies tunnustaa" Ilkka 2013.
  8. "Titteli täytti lupaukset" Suupohjan sanomat 2013.
  9. "Årets konstnär har gjort upp med livet" Syd-Österbotten 2013-04-03.
  10. "Rauhoittavaa instrumentaalia" (review of the album Zen Guitar Songs) Suupohjan sanomat 2015-09-02.
  11. "Kitarasta kuulaita sointeja Zen-virityksin" (review of the album Zen Guitar Songs) Pohjalainen 2015.
  12. "Lempeää kitaransoittoa" Pohjalainen 2016-02-03.
  13. Review of the album Zen Guitar Songs in the Jazzrytmit web magazine (in Finnish)

External links

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