Ahead of FRAMED#91, we spoke with LIGHTBOX, the Berlin-based trio: saxophonist Emma Rawicz, bassist Haggai Cohen-Milo, and drummer Amir Bresler, about improvisation, collaboration, and shaping sound in real time. Can you tell us how LIGHTBOX first came together as a trio? What drew each of you to collaborate?

Haggai: It was quite spontaneous. Amir and I have been playing together for a long time, and I’ve been playing with Emma over the past couple of years. One day, we all had a session in my apartment and just played — purely for fun, that same day we got offered a gig. We didn’t have a name or any plans for the band; it all happened very naturally, on its own.

Emma: It grew out of existing musical relationships. I was new to Berlin at the time and didn’t know many people yet. I had lived in London for five years, but in Berlin I had only been for a few months. Haggai was already a friend and a musical partner in a way, and I really wanted to start playing with people here.

Emma: It came from a simple desire to make something happen — to make music for music’s sake. It was about meeting friends and exploring new musical spaces together. For me, it has felt very warm and exploratory. LIGHTBOX has actually been a big part of my move to Berlin — our sessions together made me feel at home in the city.

How would you describe your shared musical vision? When creating new music, what sparks the first idea?

Amir: It’s very natural. We play what we feel like playing, maybe some standards or our own music, and then ideas grow out of that. We usually focus on the colour of the sound. That’s what we’re really looking for.

Haggai: There’s definitely something challenging about our setup because we don’t have a harmonic instrument. That leaves a lot of space, which is very freeing. The openness creates room for exploration.

What’s something surprising or unexpected you’ve learned from playing together?

Haggai: That a music stand helps (laughs).

Emma: It’s so difficult to come up with a name!

Haggai: Oh my God, we spent weeks trying to find one.

Emma: We started out playing without any agenda at all, and then suddenly we had to define one. That was surprisingly difficult. When something feels very natural and easy, translating it into something you can clearly communicate to other people isn’t simple. It was actually good to have those conversations: What are we trying to do? What are we trying to communicate? The distance between what feels obvious to us musically and what makes sense to people outside of that — that was unexpectedly challenging.

Haggai: I could have just kept going without any agenda. I would happily keep playing if we never had to come up with a band name. I really like the sound we developed; it came together very organically from the beginning.

Emma: Also, the scene in Berlin surprised me. It feels like there are a lot of musical extremes here, and I wasn’t used to that. London isn’t quite the same. Finding people who also enjoy

playing tunes feels like something specific in Berlin. For me, coming from the outside, that was surprising because having shared roots in the jazz tradition is such a big part of being a musician.

How did you come up with the name LIGHTBOX?

Emma: It was actually my mum’s idea! We were talking about possible names, and she said, “What about LIGHTBOX? Like a box with lots of different lights in it.” I looked it up and found this interesting definition. For a chordless trio like ours — with a dry sound and strong contrasts — it somehow made sense. There’s also something playful and essential about it.

In your music, how important is the role of space? Thinking specifically about Ricard Larsson’s studio for FRAMED #91 and the FRAMED environment, how does that affect your performance or mindset?

Haggai: I feel like there’s a lot of literature in Emma’s music, taking ideas from art outside music. As for FRAMED #91, it was more of a hunch. When I saw photos of Ricard Larsson’s sculptures, I immediately thought of the sound of this trio. The dry, chordless sound and the black-and-grey sculptures with their harsh contrast against a white background felt connected. There’s something abstract in both, and in an associative way, I felt it would work very well. I have the sense that we’ll be in an environment that supports what we’re already doing.

The environment we play in is very important during the creative process.

Emma: Hopefully, it makes you more open-minded. When you’re used to a space, there’s a certain comfort, which can be nice. But when you’re in a space that’s unfamiliar or outside your comfort zone, it can make things happen that wouldn’t otherwise occur.

If you have that unfamiliar setting but still feel grounded within the music, you can take risks — inspired by what the environment gives you. That’s something very special.

What do you want the audience at FRAMED #91 to take away from your set?

Amir: We want to have fun ourselves and be inspired by the situation — and then the audience will feel that. When I’m in the audience, I feel what the people on stage are feeling. So we just

need to be in the right state of mind, and we will be.

Emma: It’s a two-way exchange. You feed off the energy of the audience. When people are open-minded and truly there to listen and experience the art, you’re constantly giving something to each other while you’re playing. If there’s a closed-off feeling, that can be difficult, but in creative environments, that’s usually not the case. It’s an exchange of energy, a flow between the audience and the musicians on stage. We’ll take something from them and give something back. It’s like a collaboration.

Haggai: We’ll receive something, and give something, hopefully. There’s no agenda about what we want people to get out of it. We just want them to be there. To be present.

Emma: When you’re improvising, you can’t really have too much of an agenda anyway. If you’re truly improvising, you don’t know what you’re going to say until you play it. So all you can ask of people who come is that they’re present and open-minded, and then they’ll receive whatever it is you have to say.

Interview by Sascha Bystrova, assisted by Štěpánka Uková

Photos by Katha Mau (cover photo) & Sascha Bystrova (studio)