Hans Lüdemann

Blue is the color of infinity. Circular movements and cycles are basic principles of life. As musical elements, they are associated with movement and rhythmic energy - as repetitive figures, which charge themselves continually with new energy, stimulate each other and finally start to rotate and dance. To awake such primal forces and to make them audible and sensible is one of the objectives of Hans Lüdemann's ROOMS. They are translated into a sensual and physical musical approach. The musicians embody these musical elements and forces, they are continuously charged with their energies and transfer those to the listener in musical processes. The blue is also the blue of jazz, of 'blue notes', of melancholy and pain.

The TRIO IVOIRE is unique in instrumentation and musical scope, melting personal roots of African, European and Jazz traditions and uniting African balafon with piano, drums and electronics to create a contemporary sound that is without comparison. This has little to do with traditional African music, but a lot with finding artistic expression in a globalized reality. On the search of transporting traditional African instruments into the modern world on one hand, looking for new ways of expression in piano and Jazz music on the other, two worlds are approaching each other that seem far apart.

Stephan Oliva - Orbit (2019) {Yolk Records ‎YOLK J2075}
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© 2019 Yolk Records ‎| YOLK J2075
Jazz / Contemporary Jazz / Modern Creative / Piano Trio

The piano trio with bass and drums is one of the paramount forms of jazz. It permeates history and is a sort of “banner” for the standard measure of this music and a reference point by which one may appreciate the evolution of a century-old form of jazz. And ORBIT is a new chapter in that story. A pun on the initials Oliva-Rainey-Boisseau International Trio, ORBIT is a theme that drives the music of the group, perfectly illustrating what today’s trio can be: a universe of individual paths, instruments, personalities in orbit around each other. Three spheres of attraction and freedom, influence and feed into the two others. This theme naturally lends itself to the tracks that make up the album - Circles, The Tourniquet, Spirals, Wavin - but the music itself draws its energy, kinetics and interactions from it.

Marshall Gilkes & WDR Big Band - Always Forward (2018) {Alternate Side Records ‎ASR 010}
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© 2018 Westdeutscher Rundfunk / Alternate Side Records | ‎ASR 010
Jazz / Modern Big Band / Progressive Jazz / Modern Arrangement / Trombone

Trombonist, composer and arranger Marshall Gilkes released his first album with the Cologne-based WDR Big Band in 2015. Three years later, he delivers Always Forward, a follow-up recording that celebrates the big band sound, pays respect to the arrangers that have shaped and influenced him, and shines a much-needed light on where big band music is headed.

The greatest strength of Oehms Classics' live recording of the Hamburg Staatsoper 2005 production of Mathis der Maler is the supple and dramatic conducting of Simone Young, the Australian general manager of the company. The score contains some of Hindemith's most overtly romantic and emotionally expressive music, as well as some extended passages that sound like academic note-spinning. Young is remarkably successful in accentuating the score's moments of sensuality, such as the opening "Concert of Angels," and manages to keep the dramatic momentum up during the more pedestrian passages. The sound is full, clean, and well balanced for a live opera performance.