‘Flaming June’ it might not be, but hot jazz was certainly to be heard in some of Bonn’s tube stations as JazzTube entered it’s second round on Friday.
Waduh hop about energetically
Love or hate ‘Waduh’ one thing you couldn’t do was ignore their Jazz/Rap fusion music rapped in diverse languages. This young band have studied in Cologne, Freiburg, London, New York, Montreal and Madrid and gained musical experience in Madrid, Cape Town, Jakarta, New York, Recife, Rio de Janeiro, Nagoya, London, Caracas, Managua und Buenos Aires. They sang in German, Spanish und Indonesian. Good time music that had a small and enthusiastic group of dancers hopping around throughout the set I caught.
Igor Lazarev Duo (trio?!)
No hopping around to be found at the ‘Uni/Markt station though, where the ultra laidback sound of ‘Igor Lazarev Duo’ was to be found. My quick research on Igor reveals that early heroes were Steve Vai and Joe Satriani. There were no ‘String-shedding’ electric solos at breakneck speed yesterday though, instead a very welcome relaxed selection of gentle melodies that wafted gently away up the escalator to be lent an occasional burst of drama when gusts of warm tube station air sent sheet music hopping from the music stands). The duo’s other half was Stefan Berger, who has Contra-bass appearances with Clueso, Pepeu Gomes und Nigel Kennedy to his name. The third member of the duo (this is Jazz after all!) was I believe the daughter of either Igor or Stefan – I left before I found out which, but stayed long enough to know they were a class act.
Jens Böckamp (Flow Quartett)
Back down the tramline then to Museumsmeile/Heussallee and some cool jazz in the Thelonius Monk, Ornette Coleman tradition. Jens Böckamp on Saxophone will have been noticed as making a second appearance at the JazzTube, and I for one am very happy he did so. This time around he brought a quirky combo with him in the form of Dierk Peters on Vibraphone, Jan Schreiner on Tuba and Oliver Rehmann on drums. The formation, ‘Flow Quartett’, won a prize last Summer (the „Tremplin Jazz d´Avignon“) and are due to release a debut album soon.
So there you have it. JazzTube round two, and a quality bunch of ‘Jazzers’ as my short bio’s reveals. I loved them all in their own ways and as is so often the case deciding on a ‘winner’ is like deciding if Jimi Hendrix or Segovia is the better guitarist. If you are able to sort your chalk from your cheese and find a winner then don’t forget to cast your vote on the JAZZTUBE WEBSITE VOTING PAGE