Glenn Miller founded his first band in 1937. More than 80 years later, the Glenn Miller Orchestra under Will Salden plays the great bandleader’s swing hits, which sound no less fresh and lively now than they did back then.
Hardly any other dance is so sensual, melancholic and at the same time full of joie de vivre – this concert, titled »Viva el tango«, is devoted entirely to the »Tango argentino«. In the spotlight: Carlos Gardel, one of the most brilliant tango composers of the 1930s, and Astor Piazzolla, who decisively developed the virtuosic Tango Nuevo of the 1950s. The highlight of the evening: a thrilling dance performance by renowned artists Karin Solana and Andres Sautel.
The Moka Efti Orchestra, the original 14-piece big band from the hit German TV show »Babylon Berlin«, invites you to travel back in time a hundred years to the »roaring« 1920s. In 1929, the year the series is set in, the world was a very different place. Berlin was wild, dirty, glamorous and party-loving. In the »Moka Efti«, one of the city’s entertainment palaces, people danced the Charleston to opulent big-band numbers. The Elbphilharmonie Recital Hall is now transformed into a dance hall itself when the Moka Efti Orchestra, led by composers Nikko Weidemann and Mario Kamien, and saxophonist and arranger Sebastian Borkowski, bring back the music and the feeling for life of that bygone era.
The traditional Chinese New Year concert unites cultures, brings symphonic masterpieces of classical Chinese music to the stage and opens up new musical horizons. Every year for more than 25 years, first-class traditional Chinese orchestras have performed in leading concert halls during the Chinese Spring Festival, offering a rich blend of China’s diverse musical cultures.
No false modesty: in English, paramount means the top, the ultimate. With Joe Lovano and Julian Lage, two topmost soloists from two generations of jazz truly come together in the Paramount Quartet. They have already known each other for a long time and mutually motivate each other for flights of improvisation. Their accompanists Will Calhoun and Asante Santi Debriano give them the necessary inspiration and ideas every second. Joe Lovano is a giant of the tenor saxophone, admired worldwide and so versatile like no other. With the serene authority of a grandmaster, he puts jazz from all sides in the best light. Julian Lage, who is this brilliant, amiable guitarist who plays completely effortlessly, and, without a break, releases an organic mix of melodic and chordal playing from his guitar. He has been a welcome guest at the Elbphilharmonie since it opened in 2017 and you can now experience him for the sixth time. Will Calhoun is an energetic drummer, who can also arrange very complex rhythms so that they flow. Bassist Asante Santi Debriano, who was born in Panama, is not as well known in Europe as would be appropriate for his status. He played with legends, such as Archie Shepp and Sam Rivers, for a long time, collaborated on more than 100 recordings and leads an exciting nonet in New York with the Arkestra Bembe, which plays many pieces from his output. The Paramount Quartet itself has to date neither made vinyl recordings nor can you find online recordings of any of their live concerts. So, all the greater is the excitement and anticipation for a band, which will certainly play tremendously well.
With his latest album »Seeing«, Tord Gustavsen opens a new, complex chapter in his series of acclaimed trio recordings, which he began in 2003 with the now classic album »Changing Places«. The new recording with its compact, concentrated song forms »reflects my personal development, I am getting older and concentrating more and more on the essentials in life and in music,« says the Norwegian pianist.
A breathtaking musical journey that shows in a folkloristic and cheerful way the musical bridges that connect Bach and other classical European icons with the most beautiful Latin American rhythms. The concert begins with Bach and ends with him. In between, the musicians show the full richness of Latin American music.
Roughly 75 singers from 23 cultures regularly come together in the Chor zur Welt (English: World Choir) to sing together. The Elbphilharmonie’s ensemble has already achieved a very broad range of projects. This time, the choir makes a journey around the world and pays a musical visit to the native countries of its singers. »I only rarely speak Arabic in everyday life – it is a genuine sense of home when I can sing in my mother tongue here!« a Syrian choir member reveals. Along with this sense of home comes curiosity about other cultures and the social experience – because singing connects us! So, the music likewise serves as the access, platform and nourishment for the intercultural exchange which shaped the profile of the choir from the start. The Chor zur Welt is conducted by Jörg Mall, who has managed the choir since it was founded in 2016 as the Syrian/German project choir. However, the entire choir is involved in suggesting pieces when arranging its programmes – and also the expertise of everyone is sought after for the translation and practice of the correct pronunciation in the many different languages.
When Haggai Cohen-Milo describes his approach to creatively engaging with works of concert literature from the perspective of a jazz musician, it is flying objects in space that come to mind. When exploring the work, he feels like a spaceship that is drawn to the moon – the work – and thus accelerates further, finally overcoming the gravitational forces through targeted counter-steering, shooting past it and exploring new worlds: Worlds that lie beyond. Haggai Cohen-Milo, double bassist and composer, is a border crosser between genres and art forms, in demand worldwide and also a welcome guest at the Symphoniker Hamburg, most recently at the Martha Argerich Festival 2024. At the suggestion of the Symphoniker Hamburg, he has explored three heavyweights of the classical repertoire for the three-part concert series »Gravitations«. Cohen-Milo circles the work in conversation, study and improvisation, searches for the essential emotions and themes in it, uncovers them for himself and then creates something completely unique and new in sound and text with his artistic collaborators: three unique concerts between jazz, improvisation and spoken word art.
For almost two decades, Tyshawn Sorey advanced ever deeper into the realms of avant-garde jazz with his experimental drum playing before he made a radical turnaround with his album »Mesmerism« in 2022. There, he revealed himself as a fan of traditional jazz and re-recorded well-known jazz standards. On their latest CD project »Continuing«, the three consistently pursue this path and, besides a song by Sorey’s mentor, pianist Harold Mabern, also interpret the »Reincarnation Blues« by Wayne Shorter, which the saxophonist once wrote for the legendary jazz drummer Art Blakey. At a greatly reduced tempo, the combo puts the music under the microscope and brings out details in a casual swing, with an unerring commitment to each note and beat. Tyshawn Sorey is not only a well-known jazz musician but also a classical composer. This year his composition »Adagio (for Wadada Leo Smith)« for saxophone and orchestra won the famous Pulitzer Price after his work »Monochromatic Light (Afterlife)« made it to the final last year. Where will the journey go next? Well, who knows…
Nouruz is the New Year’s and spring festival in the Persian and Kurdish cultures. The Nouruz Ensemble led by Iraqi Bassem Hawar also understands »spring« as a departure – towards exciting encounters between the musicians and their second home in Germany, and with other musical styles. In this concert, however, they focus entirely on their roots. A musical journey takes the ensemble from Basra in southern Iraq to Mosul in the north. They perform pieces from the southern marshlands and poetry set to music by Iraqi Assyrians and Arameans from northern Iraq, as well as classical Arabic maqam music from the area around Baghdad and all over the country. Bassem Hawar is a virtuoso on the Iraqi joza violin, which he built and developed himself; he founded the Nouruz Ensemble as a quartet in 2018. He combines a wide variety of musical styles with virtuosity, and is a tireless ambassador for the music of his homeland. Hawar is joined by the Iranian Kiomars Musayyebi on the delicate dulcimer santur and Saad Mahmoud Jawad, one of Iraq’s most renowned oud players. Other members of Nouruz are Persian percussionist Reza Samani, who has long had his roots in the Cologne area, and the Iraqi Rageed William on Armenia’s national instrument, the melancholy-sounding shawm duduk and the smoky-sounding flute nai. The guest vocalist is Baghdad-born Rita William, who works at the interface between Christian and Arabic singing.
Dominican composer and pianist Michel Camilo, winner of Grammy, Latin Grammy, and Emmy awards, blends jazz, classical, pop, and world music with Caribbean influences. This concert features his energetic Piano Concerto No. 1, fusing jazz and classical elements, alongside Bernstein's "Candide" overture, reflecting Camilo's diverse musicality.
»I don’t want to be a normal singer«, says Leïla Martial, »my goal is freedom on stage.« There, she becomes a fascinating, multifaceted being: virtuosic and playful, strong and fragile, tragic and comic. Among her influences, the »uncrowned queen of French vocal jazz« (JazzZeitung) includes singers like Sarah Vaughan, Nina Simone, or Björk, and instrumentalists like Lee Konitz, Emile Parisien, and Eric Dolphy. She is also fascinated by the songs of the Pygmies and the Inuit, »who approach music differently – to accompany their daily lives, not as a show«. By her side is Valentin Ceccaldi, one of the most original cellists in European jazz. Whether in chanson, art song, or free dialogue: Ceccaldi can transform into an orchestra – multifaceted, with gripping intensity. When Sebastian Studnitzky, Pascal Schumacher, and Edward Perraud, known as Singülar, come together, it’s time to buckle up, lean back, and keep all antennas up. Because something truly new is being created right before your eyes and ears. Genres like jazz, classical, or electronic music are just the starting points, and instruments like piano, trumpet, vibraphone, and drums are the tools for an intense, sensual journey. Dreamily, motifs sail through the room. They are caught in free flight and transform into melodic sculptures; rhythmic sketches develop from delicate grooves to trance.
Here comes the Sarahbanda, the Cuban band with a difference! Formed as part of the hugely popular »Mozart y Mambo« project and led by Sarah Willis of the Berlin Philharmonic, Sarahbanda explores the captivating dance rhythms of Cuba in a way that has never been heard before. The difference? Sarahbanda is the first salsa band to feature a French horn, and with their original compositions and stunning, exclusive re-arrangements of some of Cuba’s best-known songs, this band is taking the Cuban music scene by storm. This flavourful combination of Sarah Willis and some of Cuba’s most talented musicians creates a completely new sound that is fresh, innovative, danceable and simply irresistible.
»I don’t want to be a normal singer«, says Leïla Martial, »my goal is freedom on stage.« There, she becomes a fascinating, multifaceted being: virtuosic and playful, strong and fragile, tragic and comic. Among her influences, the »uncrowned queen of French vocal jazz« (JazzZeitung) includes singers like Sarah Vaughan, Nina Simone, or Björk, and instrumentalists like Lee Konitz, Emile Parisien, and Eric Dolphy. She is also fascinated by the songs of the Pygmies and the Inuit, »who approach music differently – to accompany their daily lives, not as a show«. By her side is Valentin Ceccaldi, one of the most original cellists in European jazz. Whether in chanson, art song, or free dialogue: Ceccaldi can transform into an orchestra – multifaceted, with gripping intensity. When Sebastian Studnitzky, Pascal Schumacher, and Edward Perraud, known as Singülar, come together, it’s time to buckle up, lean back, and keep all antennas up. Because something truly new is being created right before your eyes and ears. Genres like jazz, classical, or electronic music are just the starting points, and instruments like piano, trumpet, vibraphone, and drums are the tools for an intense, sensual journey. Dreamily, motifs sail through the room. They are caught in free flight and transform into melodic sculptures; rhythmic sketches develop from delicate grooves to trance.
Together with the multi-award-winning soloist Alexis Cárdenas (violin) and the Grammy winners Miguel Siso (cuatro) and Celso Duarte (harp), the Bremen Baroque Orchestra presents the world-famous violin concertos The Four Seasons in the context of Latin American soundscapes.
You do not have to be born in New Orleans to be able to grasp and play jazz in all its encyclopaedic breadth. That said, it is probably helpful to grow up in the place where jazz was born around 125 years ago and has shaped the lives of the people living there as a kind of mother tongue. Whatever the case, Sullivan Fortner is the latest example of jazz music to come out of New Orleans that is absolutely contemporary and, at the same time, deeply rooted in history. One audience at the Elbphilharmonie has already made the acquaintance of Fortner, born in 1986, as one of the lecturers at its »Jazz Academy« in late summer 2023. And he has been known the world over for many years now, thanks to album releases and video recordings like those where he can be heard alongside the magnificent singer Cécile McLorin Salvant. In their various duo performances, he comes across as a congenial piano partner, bursting with ideas and wit, and always finding different shades and variations on the spur of the moment for his accompaniment. Most recently, Sullivan Fortner released »Solo Game« (2023), an album where he juggles eras, genres and various forms of jazz expression with astonishing ease on the piano. The jazz piano guru Brad Mehldau recently heard him play solo in Amsterdam and raved afterwards: »Beyond compare. Many of you will know how unreal his music is... Sullivan just blows me away every time I hear him. He goes deep on all levels – touch, counterpoint, extreme relaxation, swing, the transparency of his ideas, no matter how dense the texture is at any one time. Sullivan takes you with him through the entire emotional spectrum, including uninhibited joyfulness. He is completely rooted and completely independent all at once. He’s revolutionizing jazz piano playing right now. I mean, piano playing in general. Period.«
Jazz singer Jeff Cascaro has elegantly shaped international vocal jazz over the last twenty years. His new stage programme takes a look at New York and Broadway, among other places. Here, where the great songs of the genre were written, the nocturnal musical life continues to provide the pulse for many great artists. Jeff Cascaro has incorporated the sound magic of the cosmopolitan city into his programme and interprets classics such as »On Broadway« and »New York, New York« over the warm sound of his top-class band! His musically alert eye is also focussed on soul, blues and the great songs of old. »Hand-picked metropolitan gems« is how the artist describes his selection for the evening. His interpretation of the songs is fresh and forms a multi-faceted programme of up-tempo tracks and ballads. He is supported by his fellow musicians, who back him up with sparkling piano lines, swinging drum grooves and earthy bass playing. The music brings a sparkling piece of the metropolis to the Laeiszhalle and perfectly showcases Jeff Cascaro’s warm and multi-faceted voice. Music with style and cosmopolitan flair.
High voltage. The complete package: rhythmically, harmonically, sonically. The collaboration between the NDR Bigband and composer Darcy James Argue promises serious fun. An awareness of tradition is paired with the open horizon of the internet age and the desire to wildly combine and re-contextualise.
»Maria Baptist’s rhapsodic, free-flowing piano style is reminiscent of Bill Evans and Keith Jarrett,« writes the renowned Downbeat Magazine, naming the pianist and composer in the same breath as two of the great jazz pianists of our time. The recordings for the new album were made during her debut at the Elbphilharmonie. Maria Baptist’s piano solo cycle interweaves the grand dramaturgy of symphonic works with her profound improvisations to create a new sound experience. Between her powerful virtuosity, subtle polyphony in the spirit of Bach and her boundless lyricism, Maria Baptist’s music reveals an attitude to life of freedom and courage and thus becomes a message to be guided by hopes rather than fears.
Already once planned for 2022, the tail end of the Covid pandemic thwarted the wanderlust of Maria Schneider. But postponed is not cancelled: now, the American composer and bandleader presents her ninth album »Data Lords«, which was just awarded two Grammys. Maria Schneider stands for jazz compositions in cinemascope format, for profound, superbly arranged works with the Oslo Jazz Ensemble alongside her this time, for its part a powerhouse of Norwegian jazz creativity. »Data Lords«, this is something like the catapult handmade by David with which Maria Schneider as a resistant, seemingly powerless warrior flings a couple of shiny prepared cannonballs of sound against the Goliath of the tech and music industry. In the USA, the composer is a powerful voice for copyright protection and for the fair payment of musicians in times of streaming services. The music of her ninth album also carries this fighting spirit within it, which she released, as ever, entirely on her own.
After a series of successful readings, the renowned Moka Efti Orchestra returns to the stage in 2025 together with acclaimed actor Benno Fürmann and guest star Le Pustra to once again immerse themselves in a world that brings the dazzling atmosphere of 1920s Berlin to life. The extraordinary ensemble, made famous by the internationally successful series "Babylon Berlin", not only brings the music and glamour of the era to the stage, but also the dark, fascinating stories from Volker Kutscher’s novel »Der nasse Fisch«.
Derya Yıldırım and her international band continue their psychedelic journey, meandering through Anatolian folk music and poetry with their electrifying grooves, while also delving into their own lives and personal experiences. New interpretations of Turkish classics and the band’s original compositions are seamlessly tied together by inventive arrangements and spellbinding grooves, transcending time as past and present collide in the space of one song. While rooted in Anatolian tradition, Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek draw on a boundless cosmos of sounds and builds on the contribution of each band member. Born in 2014, and with 3 albums and one EP under their belt, the group has forged a formidable reputation with their heady mix of Anatolian folk, 1970s Turkish psychedelia, pop and jazz. For their performance at the Elbphilharmonie, Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek present a special programme featuring a string of new compositions. Their fans will discover these songs on their fourth LP, recorded in the USA in 2024 and due to be released in spring 2025. Special guests and surprises are to be expected, as the group has multiplied their connections over the years and expanded their visions of musical arrangements and stage production. Yıldırım grew up in the multicultural neighborhood of Veddel, where she was influenced by the culture and music of neighboring communities as well as that of her family, learning the bağlama alongside piano, saxophone and guitar. Despite being multilingual, Yıldırım exclusively sings in Turkish: »It’s really important to me because that’s the language I can really express myself in – it’s my emotional language«, she explains. Graham Mushnik (organ, synthesizers) and Antonin Voyant (guitar, bass, and flute) are both members of London/France-based collective Catapulte Records and have played in l’Orchestre du Montplaisant, a quartet known for its cinematic, retro atmospheres. Capetonian drummer Helen Wells has introduced her own style from the South African DIY and psychedelic scenes into the live set since 2022.
The great French-Algerian singer-songwriter Souad Massi has been called the »Tracy Chapman of the Maghreb«. Perhaps because she also develops her songs musically around her delicate guitar playing and stands up for freedom, justice, female emancipation, humanism and love in her lyrics. Massi studied classical music as well as Arabic-Andalusian music and developed her own style over time in which, alongside Algerian folk, influences from independent rock also play a key role. Each song by Souad Massi sounds like an elaborate miniature from a musical continent which she invented herself. She sings in French, Arabic and Kabyle, a Berber language spoken in the north of Algeria. She brings a sextet to Hamburg which sometimes makes music in the refined style of chamber music on acoustic instruments and then again in infectious grooves. The mainstay of the ensemble is Rabah Khalfa, who plays the darbuka, a drum with a metal bowl and comparatively high tone.
Silk and bamboo – these are the fabrics used to produce the finely woven traditional music of south-east China. Pipa virtuoso Lingling Yu takes this fine art from her adopted home of Geneva out into the world with a young quartet of other traditional instruments. Lingling Yu comes from the nine-million-strong metropolis of Hangzhou, south of Shanghai, a centre of the silk and tea industry and also China’s own Silicon Valley. Even as a teenager, she was considered a child prodigy on the pear-shaped pipa, a necked bowl lute originally fitted with silk strings. In 1998, Yu moved to Switzerland in order to establish ties between Chinese and Western music, broadening her horizons by studying orchestration, counterpoint and composition. In addition to the pipa, her Silk and Bamboo Quartet brings together other traditional instruments: Wenqi Gu plays the guzheng, a 21-string, 2,500-year-old arched zither. The internationally experienced Guo Gan brings the erhu and gaohu violins to the quartet; he is also well versed in Western classical music and jazz. The quartet is completed by the young Hongze An, who has a command of the bamboo transverse flutes dizi and xiao, the mouth organ sheng and the bawu with its clarinet-like sound. Alternating between solo and ensemble performances, the group’s repertoire includes pieces from the south-east of China and the provinces of Canton and Yunnan as well as from the cities of Chaozhou and Hangzhou.
For pianist Michael Wollny, the trio with bassist Tim Lefebvre and drummer Eric Schaefer is the constant in his otherwise constantly changing cosmos of collaborations. The three musicians share an almost inexhaustible musical vocabulary, an outstanding sensitivity in playing together and the ability to create new music of tremendous tension and dynamism from the moment. The band is a unity of three unmistakable characters: Michael Wollny is regarded as one of the most important European pianists of his generation. His playing blends influences from jazz, classical music, indie pop, new and early music to create an unmistakable personal style. Wollny has been playing together with drummer Eric Schaefer for more than 20 years. The two share a deep intimacy and at the same time the ability to constantly surprise and challenge each other. American Tim Lefebvre forms the foundation of the trio, with a weighty tone, rock-solid groove and a fine sense of dramaturgy. Together, Wollny, Schaefer and Lefebvre create music of exuberant dynamics, boundless variety and maximum urgency. With reference to the origins of the piano trio format, the British Jazzwise Magazine writes: »The Michael Wollny Trio makes it clear that we are living in the 21st century and not in the 1960s!«
»Portable Infinity« is the name of the Scandinavian-American project. The all-star quartet carries with it not only the history of jazz but also personal encounters with greats like Pat Metheny, Herbie Hancock, John Scofield, and Esbjörn Svensson. Many elements come together here: extensive experience, openness to new ideas, and the sheer joy of playing. David Helbock is one of those musicians who brim with ideas. Almost every year, he surprises with a new band. The »storyteller at the piano« (3Sat) still considers his long-standing group »Random/Control« to be his most significant project. A hallmark of the trio is the multitude of instruments. Often, far more than three can be heard simultaneously: piano, percussion, clarinets, saxophones, flutes, didgeridoo, and all sorts of brass transform the stage into a madcap playground.
Anyone with vision should – make music! At least, as far as the Lux Quartet is concerned. With drummer Allison Miller and pianist Myra Melford, it combines two of the most visionary free-jazz musicians of our age. You could already experience both in the jazz series at the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle as a duo; now, they come to the Recital Hall at the Elbphilharmonie as the main act with saxophonist Dayna Stephens and bassist Nick Dunston. With Alison Miller, one of the most creative drummers and bandleaders is at its heart. She was picked up by »Downbeat Magazine« in their line-up of the »Top 20 Jazz Drummers« and the American radio station NPR Music rates her composition »Otis Was a Polar Bear« as one of the »200 Greatest Songs by 21st Century Women«. The title of their current CD project »Tomorrowland« hints that the Lux Quartet is pursuing its experimental approach on its new record as well and once again expands on its own expectations of the future. As an established team, the combo can steadfastly rely on each other and so is in position to have no difficulty with free improvisations at any conceivable musical place.
»Portable Infinity« is the name of the Scandinavian-American project. The all-star quartet carries with it not only the history of jazz but also personal encounters with greats like Pat Metheny, Herbie Hancock, John Scofield, and Esbjörn Svensson. Many elements come together here: extensive experience, openness to new ideas, and the sheer joy of playing. David Helbock is one of those musicians who brim with ideas. Almost every year, he surprises with a new band. The »storyteller at the piano« (3Sat) still considers his long-standing group »Random/Control« to be his most significant project. A hallmark of the trio is the multitude of instruments. Often, far more than three can be heard simultaneously: piano, percussion, clarinets, saxophones, flutes, didgeridoo, and all sorts of brass transform the stage into a madcap playground.
»Swing King« Andrej Hermlin and his big band embark on a journey to America in the 1930s, to the great era of a music that is currently experiencing a remarkable renaissance – swing! The repertoire includes numerous well-known but also rare original arrangements, melodies by the most famous orchestras of the swing era, such as Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller. Of course, songs from their recently released album »Swing Is On Parade« are not to be missed. The Swing Dance Orchestra is authentic down to the last detail: the sound, the arrangements, the microphones and the desks, the instruments and the wardrobe all correspond to the American originals of the time.
ConcertPulse