Jazz Articles

Michaela Rabitsch & Robert Pawlik Quartet: Voyagers

by Ian Patterson
December 25, 2012

Trumpeter Michaela Rabitsch and guitarist Robert Pawlik's partnership spans fifteen years and, until now, three joint recordings. Their fourth recording presents another offering of all-originals, following Moods (Extrapolate, 2009), and is inspired by tours of Europe, Asia and Africa. Melody and groove are firmly to the forefront, evoking Balkan, Spanish and Arabic moods, as well as the Americas. Instantly appealing melodies and the generally sunny disposition of the music should make this a hit with lovers of smooth jazz, but ...

Michaela Rabitsch & Robert Pawlik Quartet: Voyagers

by C. Michael Bailey
November 4, 2012

Austrian vocalist/trumpeter Michaela Rabitsch and guitarist Robert Pawlik have fronted a quartet and performed as a duo for the past 15 years, releasing three CDs ahead of the present Voyagers. Concentrating on original compositions that lean in a commercial-popular direction, the pair has received a good deal of buzz. The majority of Voyagers is prepared very much with a broad European audience in mind. Rabitsch's vocals are smoky (she is no female Chet Baker-as the press has called her-because she ...

Michaela Rabitsch and Robert Pawlik Quartet: Moods

by Michael P. Gladstone
September 3, 2008

For those in search of a reasonably unique ensemble, the Austrian-based Michaela Rabitsch and Robert Pawlik Quartet has something to offer. Rabitsch is one of Austria's most popular jazz trumpeters and vocalists, while Pawlik--her musical and domestic partner--is a guitarist. The remainder of their group provides acoustic bass and drums with the special appearance of electric bass and percussion.

Working as a team over the course of the past ten years, they have patented an interesting approach to ...

Karlheinz Miklin & Quinteto Argentina: Aniversario - Sketches from Illyro-Argentina

by Ian Patterson
July 12, 2007

Austrian saxophonist Karlheinz Miklin may not be a household name. Nevertheless, collaborations with trumpeters Art Farmer and Randy Brecker, trombonist Albert Mangelsdorff, bassists Chuck Israels and Graham Collier, and saxophonist Michael Brecker (not forgetting his long association with bassist Ron McClure and drummer Billy Hart) testify to the esteem in which his peers hold him.

Aside from his trio with McClure and Hart and his own Austrian quartet of nearly thirty years standing, Miklin has led the Quinteto ...

Peter Natterer: The Passing

by Ronald S. Russ
October 22, 2006

Electronic manipulation and saxophones go back a long time--remember reedman Rahsaan Roland Kirk's phrase “boogie electric"? The best-known might be tenor saxophonist Eddie Harris, who played the Varitone (an electric saxophone made by Selmer). Many have been known to blow electronic horns, including Michael Brecker, Marshall Allen and Wayne Shorter, to name but a few.What Austrian tenor saxophonist Peter Natterer brings to the table is an almost synthesizer-like quality in which he alternates between using and not using ...

Paul Urbanek feat. Alex MacHacek: The Next Generation of Sound

by Phil DiPietro
October 1, 2001

Now comes a band proclaiming themselves as “The Next Generation of Sound," superheroes of creative musicality and musicianship. I mean, how dare they ! We're all out here pummeling search engines, reading jazz reviews, sharing sound files and hitting the clubs trying to figure out where it's really going to come from. Guess what? The next generation of sound, at least in part, is comin' 'atcha from some borough of Austria, precisely the neighborhood in which Paul Urbanek (keyboards) and ...