Articles

Franz Koglmann Septet: Fruits Of Solitude

By Mark Corroto

Franz Koglmann must be a connoisseur of vinification, i.e. winemaking, because his Fruits Of Solitude has the feel of a master vintner at work. Specifically, wine blends like Super Tuscans or Côtes du Rhônes mark his amalgam of European chamber music and American jazz. Koglmann is a true polymath in that he hears all and rejects any codifications, much like Duke Ellington did throughout his long career. As for Ellington, his classic “Solitude" is the inspiration for the ...

Franz Koglmann: Join!

By Eyal Hareuveni

Austrian, Vienna-based composer Franz Koglmann always used music as a means to present his ideas, often provocative perspectives, on cultural phenomena at large. He alienated the American jazz community with A White Line (hatART, 1990), where he sketched an alternative history of jazz based on white innovative musicians. Later he reconstructed the compositional ideas of Johan Strauss to modern jazz vocabulary on An Affair with Strauss (Between the Lines, 2000) and upstaged the poems of T.S. Elliot on Fear Death ...

Franz Koglmann: Lo-lee-ta: Music on Nabokov

By Eyal Hareuveni

Viennese composer and trumpeter Franz Koglmann is a well-known commuter between the arts and modern chamber jazz. His subtle, sophisticated compositions create a set of mirrors that reflect a distinct artistic mean: literature on Make Believe (Between the Lines, 1999), inspired by Jean Cocteau; poetry on O Moon My Pin-Up (hatOLOGY, 1997), inspired by Ezra Pound and Fear Death By Water (Between the Lines, 2003), dedicated to poetry of T.S. Elliot; cinematic images on Venus In Transit (Between the Lines, ...

Franz Koglmann: Viewing Jazz through Other Arts

By Eyal Hareuveni

The music of Viennese composer/trumpeter/flugelhornist Franz Koglmann sounds like no other. He manages to marry his love for the West Coast cool jazz with elements from European modern and classic music composers, especially Franz Schubert, Alban Berg and Anton von Webern. His thematic compositions, recorded almost solely for the Swiss, Basel-based HatHut and for the German, Frankfurt-based Between the Lines labels, are complex. Quite often ironic and melancholic, always playful, detached from sentimentality but still very emotional, and usually demanding. ...

Between The Lines Turns Five, Part 2-2

By Budd Kopman

Part 1 | Part 2

I apologize for the delay between parts 1 and 2 of this trek through an incredibly varied body of recordings. Rather than repeat my introductory remarks (seen here ), I will summarize the basic esthetic of the record label known as Between the Lines. Franz Koglmann wants to explore the boundary edges of the compositional and the improvisational, the intersection of jazz (however you define it) with other performing arts and the juxtaposition of “high" ...

Franz Koglmann: Don't Play, Just Be

By Glenn Astarita

Once again, the brilliant Austrian composer/flugelhornist Franz Koglmann derives inspiration and motivation from literary and cinematic works. This extravaganza, features a full-blown chamber orchestra to augment the work of famed jazz soloists, James Emery (guitar), Tony Coe (woodwinds) and others. Here, Koglmann delves into the Third Stream with this hybrid symphonic/modern jazz/big band program.

Koglmann divides this set into two theme pieces: “Don't Play, Just Be (for quartet and chamber orchestra)" and “Spate Liebe (4 Songs based on ...

Franz Koglmann: An Affair With Strauss

By Glenn Astarita

Following up the excellent Make Believe, artistic director and roster artist for the young Between The Lines label--trumpeter-composer Franz Koglmann--pays a bit of homage to composer Johann Strauss' melodies, waltzes and overall elegance on the aptly titled, An Affair With Strauss. Here, the venerable trumpeter once again enlists the support of the equally talented and somewhat legendary reedman Tony Coe and all-world bassist Peter Herbert while guitarist Burkhard Stangl also lends his expertise to this drummer-less band known as Monoblue ...