On the evening of the 19th of January I attended the official
presentation and release of the new
Burghausen Big
Band CD in the main hall at the Citizens’ building
in Burghausen (new town). The CD presentation included a free
concert by the Big Band, who’s program consisted of
some of the sophisticated new compositions by Jan-Peter
Klöpfel from their new CD, as well as a selection of
popular jazz standards. We had two hours of accomplished
musicians playing fine music. And a good time was had by
all.
The city of Burghausen is located in the far southeast corner
of Germany on the border with Austria. It can boast of having
an idyllic old town center, above which towers the longest
complex of castle buildings in Europe. But it is not for this
that many thousands of jazz aficionados from all of Germany
and Europe have been making a pilgrimage here each spring for
more than 40 years. The reason is that jazz has found a home
in Burghausen. The association IG Jazz, which organizes and
promotes the annual event “Burghausen International
Jazz Week,” is composed of up to a hundred jazz
enthusiasts from around the region, numerous volunteers and a
committed mayor, as well as a large number of sponsors from
the business world.
The fact is, Burghausen does not only create exceptional
circumstances for the week during Jazzwoche, but the scene is
active throughout the year - with concerts (either in the
open-air or in the cozy "Jazz Keller"), jazz workshops, and
much more.
This is also attested to by another institution: the
Burghausen Big Band, in which dedicated and skilled amateur
musicians from the region have been celebrating jazz on a
large scale for - believe it or not - 35 years. The list of
past conductors includes such well-known names as Joe Viera,
Al Porcino and Geoff Clarke. In the past the band has often
had support from such soloists as Peter Tuscher, Lee Harper,
Alan Prasquin and Roman Schwaller. Wolfgang Pietsch has been
the head of the big band since 2002, and he has been working
on the ambitious project of recording a CD for over two
years. Firstly, Jan-Peter Klöpfel from Hamburg was
contracted to compose music and do the arrangements for the
band, as well as provide his support during the recording and
perform solos. Klöpfel's compositions are certainly not
your standard big band material, harmonic ideas, rhythmic
changes, colorful phrases and interesting tones make this CD a
joy to listen to.
"Blue Truth" is the result of dedication and hard work. It is
a testimony to the ability of the Burghausen big band to unite
old hands and young musicians of the next generation in
creating music with a great deal of zeal and passion. This may
also be considered an indication of the joy with which a
region in Bavaria not only keeps alive a genre that has often
been dismissed as outdated, but also provides grounds for
optimism for a long and prosperous future.
