6 March 1941 – 22 June 2023
Peter Brötzmann passed away late last week at his home in Wuppertal. He was 82.
Brötzmann was a giant of creative music, with a recorded legacy spanning more than 50 years. May his memory be a blessing.
I had the good fortune to see him perform several times, ranging from his Chicago Tentet to Sonore, his trio with Mats Gustaffson and Ken Vandermark. His sound was unmistakable, but his playing was full of surprises.
3 comments:
A life which seems to demand celebration: PB was a true force of nature, and it is somehow almost unthinkable that his fire has finally been extinguished. Of course his influence will survive him.
Unlike you, I never did manage to see him play live. Over the next few days I will be rooting through my CD-rs in search of suitable recordings to play in order to mark his passing... any demons lurking in the nooks and crannies of this house are hereby given fair warning XD
I've been listening to two PB rarities which were shared back in the C#9 days: The Atlanta Concert (with Fred Hopkins and Hamid Drake), and Hyperion (with Drake and Marilyn Crispell). I've also picked out some other stuff to play during the week.
I was saying to McC earlier that I'd only recently been reminded of the fact that Brötzmann joined the experimental rock band Oxbow for a one-off concert in 2018 - at the Moers Festival, indeed. I read about this at the time... and then forgot it, but the performance ended up being released as an album last year (on the Viennese label Trost Records, which has put out tons of PB's stuff in recent years). Oxbow is actually a particular favourite band of mine, but I don't have a copy of this album (yet); when I went looking in the usual place for it, I found something better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifa48wmaonE
I saw Peter Brötzmann in concert at Banlieues Bleues festival, in the late '90/early 2000. It was a trio with Hamid Drake and Mahmoud Ghania, master Gnawa musician from Morocco. A powerful experience. And with regards to his discography I would like to mention a favorite album of mine : Brötzmann/Van Hove/Bennink - Tschüs, recorded in 1975 and released on FMP. A very diverse instrumentarium with accordion, a clarinet duo, bass sax... Dreamlike or indus climates, celestial accordions, and Peter Brötzmann as a crooner to conclude the record.
Post a Comment