Decades of Worldwide Promotion By the Man in the Room

A Life In Music
Wulf Müller
384 Pages
ISBN: # 9798353190752
Amazon Direct Publishing
2022

Working in Europe and facilitating jazz internationally, Wulf Müller reveals himself in his autobiography A Life in Music (Amazon Direct Publishing, 2022) as a man who for 40 years was in the rooms where it happened. That was true even by long distance phone call, as with Sonny Rollins who held Müller on the line while the saxophonist practiced repetitions of some troublesome licks and then returned to the conversation once musically satisfied.

There is humor within Müller's story, as when totally baffled by Ornette Coleman's theories of Harmolodics, but not dissuaded from promoting the musician. Coleman had regaled him about an earlier concert that failed to sell a single ticket: the audience had thought that "Free Jazz" meant free admission. Read our coverage.

Born in Germany in 1955, Müller moved to Austria with his family, attended university in Vienna and started his career there with a jazz club, miles smiles Jazz Café, which remains under different ownership. The club had the good fortune to find Bill Frisell and Zakir Hussain available in the opening weekends between other engagements. From there Müller started a jazz magazine, worked in import product management for Polygram Austria, and then on to a career in marketing and artist relations worldwide for Polygram, Sony Music, Universal Music Group, EmArcy and Verve Records under varying business structures, and director of an attempted restoration of the historic label OKeh.

Müller's experience yields important technical information, as at page 196, about how promotional efforts are coordinated and timed with album releases: calculating backward from the anticipated release date to schedule interviews, photography, graphics and tour support, useful to any musician to understand how the process operates. He also describes at pages 352-353 the evolving role of A&R, "artists and repertoire," once important for finding and developing artists but changed because of digital technology by which artists can produce themselves. Labels, even if independent, he says, are still important for their marketing and distribution functions, and act more now like collectors of talent rather than producers. A&R becomes a broker of talent, guiding artists toward receptive labels and making matches.

Müller's early promotion jobs in Europe included the trombonist Christian Muthspiel and his guitarist brother Wolfgang Muthspiel, and American avant-garde vocalist Linda Sharrock. His subsequent career contacts ranged from Joe Henderson, Herbie Hancock, Diana Krall, Chick Corea to Joe Zawinul and more, and into the present with guitarist Julian Lage and trumpeter Theo Croker.

There is an avalanche of people and dates in the book. It is not a blur, as Müller remains clear-eyed throughout, and relationships matter to him. His wife Yolanda and daughter Hannah are constant supports, and family dinners and reunions with friends and business associates who become friends count for much. He shares acts elsewhere that he is unable to sign or promote.

The book is a guide to the robust market of European performers who, like Müller himself, are little-known in the U.S., but who gain notice in this encyclopedic series of entries. Jazz festivals in Europe serve important marketing purposes rather than simply as entertainment venues. New talent is showcased abundantly around the lure of headliners, and headliners themselves are shuffled for greater exposure, like Krall, Müller relates, when anointed for stardom.

Müller relates how artists and projects develop. Müller listened to Branford Marsalis with Kurt Elling on a New Orleans night when the music was "not quite there," but evolved for studio recording over a weeklong engagement. It ripened into the Grammy-nominated Upward Spiral co-released by OKeh and Marsalis Music in 2016. Müller witnessed James Carter's excessively abundant talent become channeled under the guidance of Mosaic Records producer Michael Cuscuna for EmArcy's Present Tense, release in 2008. Tunisian oud player Dhafer Youssef is among those presented under Müller's wide geographic net as "European" jazz markets include sound from the Middle East, North Africa and Asia.

Disappointments and confusion accompany the successes, and acceptance takes the edges off of the toll as Müller soldiers on. OKeh is revitalized, but then left unsupported and performers drawn off elsewhere. Catalogs are gutted as companies deal away their assets for bookkeeping or corporate reasons. An option to record Hancock lapses when a back office fails to track its renewal date. Companies reorganize, positions are reassigned, and talent falls through the cracks or sometimes recaptured. Charlie Haden is dropped by the U.S. division of a label but picked up by Müller for the French division of the same conglomerate where the bassist's sales soar.

Some artists choose the greater attention they might gain from a smaller company rather the supposed clout of a major label. Other performers don't break out when they fail to excite a higher executive, notwithstanding Müller's appreciation; marketing funds are denied and the artist departs. The reasons may be highly subjective, or unexplained. Others derail their careers with an over-assessment of their place in the business, while others, notably Dee Dee Bridgewater for Müller, zealously assist promotion.

An index for all this would have been useful to sort out the various mentions and to track particular individuals as they re-appear throughout Müller's narrative, but the text, organized by years, is friendly enough to invite random browsing. Individual events are often mentioned but not given much more weight other than that they occurred, particularly as noteworthy musicians pass away.

Upon the 2019 death of Italian drummer Paolo Vinaccia, a beloved friend, Müller admits that "the show must go on" feels out of place but "is the harsh reality," and proceeds to view more acts at the North Sea Jazz Festival. The book substantively concludes with Müller's retirement and his own 66th birthday in 2021, but the end pages squeeze in notes of deal making continuing into 2022, as if he wasn't quite finished with the book or the business and still had more to say and do. The foreword promises an internet blog, which continues.

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