Birgit Minichmayr

Various Artists - Magic Moments 14 "In The Spirit Of Jazz"CD / digital"More than any other art form, music touches people directly," is ACT founder Siggi Loch's credo. For nearly 30 years, the core of what the label does has been to find and to promote the artists who can inspire the mind, reach the heart and touch the soul, and who do so in ways that have a lasting impact. Perhaps this has never been more important than now in the time of the pandemic, when culture has been silenced, when people have felt emotionally isolated and – far too often – the only “reality” has been virtual. With sixteen tracks from the current ACT release schedule, "Magic Moments 14" gathers together all of the power of "Music in the Spirit of Jazz", this world language beyond words which is understandable to everyone. It not only brings people together, it also moves and inspires them. ACT’s main mission is in the absolute foreground on this album: to be a discovery label. ACT’s main focus has always been on European jazz, to document this art form growing and developing, to show it reflecting on its own musical traditions, linking them back to jazz’s American roots and thereby opening up new paths. So, in that spirit, "Magic Moments 14" begins with a "Canzon del fuego fatuo" from the remarkable young Spanish pianist Daniel Garcia. Here is a fascinating new voice from Spanish jazz, taking up the music of his homeland in a refreshingly new way. We also mark here the ACT debut of mesmerising Austrian actor Birgit Minichmayr. Here is a voice and a personality with charismatic presence, delivering a Shakespeare Sonnet in the grand manner, together with Quadro Nuevo’s versatile world music team and the early jazz specialist Bernd Lhotzky. Other examples of new shining stars in the European musical firmament are the French-Algerian cellist and singer Nesrine and Austrian pianist David Helbock’s new trio. This focus on new and recent arrivals at the label does not mean neglecting the artists who have been with ACT since the beginning and who have made it the leading label for Swedish jazz: trombonist Nils Landgren contributes a new humdinger from his Funk Unit, a band which has been giving soul jazz a European face for over twenty-five years. Bassist/composer Lars Danielsson again celebrates the combination of classical music, jazz and Nordic sound with "Cloudland" from his new Liberetto album. Ida Sand conti-nues the tradition of Scandinavian singers who enrich the world's songbook with their pop "in the spirit of jazz". And for the final track, Jan Lundgren and Lars Danielsson, toge-ther with Emile Parisien, the French musician who has single-handedly redefined the soprano saxophone, show us Euro-pean art music with a Swedish accent at its most communicative and inspired. Last but not least, ACT was one of the first important labels to promote contemporary German jazz. There are more German artists on "Magic Moments 14" than ever before, demonstrating this important strand: violinist Florian Willeitner from Passau; guitarist Philipp Schiepek who has made a meteoric rise in the South German scene; the feisty attitude of KUU! led by singer Jelena Kuljic – like Minichmayr also primarily known for her acting and stagecraft; the Jazzrausch Bigband, whose techno jazz is attracting attention worldwide; and two rising stars who are currently harvesting all of the major awards, Johanna Summer and Vincent Meissner.Summer and Meissner - like Garcia, Lundgren and Helbock - also stand for the special place ACT has always found for the best pianists in Europe. Thus it is two German pianists of major international significance who complete the offering on "Magic Moments 14": 77-year-old Joachim Kühn is still utterly driven and a major force; his heir apparent Michael Wollny can also be heard here in his new all-star quartet with Emile Parisien, Tim Lefebvre and Christian Lillinger. The drummer was a multiple award-winner at the new German Jazz Prize, including one for KUU!. "Magic Moments 14" is a quintessence of the many directions which genre-crossing, innovative jazz is currently taking. These difficult times need remedies that are both energising and emotionally affecting: here are musicians who unfailingly show us the value and importance of trust and dialogue.Credits: Compilation by Siggi Loch Mastered by Klaus Scheuermann

Birgit Minichmayr - As An Unperfect Actor - Nine Shakespeare SonnetsCD / Vinyl / digital Birgit Minichmayr vocals Bernd Lhotzky piano & musical director Mulo Francel tenor sax, clarinet, double-bass clarinet & sansula Andreas Hinterseher accordion, bandoneon, vibrandoneon Philipp Schiepek guitar D.D. Lowka double bass &percussion Birgit Minichmayr captures the imagination and holds centrestage on “As An Unperfect Actor – Nine Sonnets by William Shakespeare”. This won’t come as a surprise to people in the German-speaking world, where the Austrian actor is well-known from countless appearances on TV and a substantial filmography. Perhaps equally unsurprising is the deep experience she can bring to Shakespeare: as an ensemble member of the Burgtheater company in Vienna, she has repeatedly lived out the searingly dramatic lives of the Bard’s characters, notably the daemonic anger of Lady Macbeth, the sadness of Ophelia, and even the uncomfortable truths of the Fool in King Lear. What might be more of a surprise, however, is the exhilarating musicality she shows on this, her first complete album as a vocalist. One could have predicted the crystal clarity, meaning and intent in her words – the desolation in her voice in “the very birds are mute...the leaves look pale” in Sonnet 97, for example. And yet there is more, much more, not least Minichmayr’s uncannily natural instinct to find artful and felicitous ways to shape musical phrases. Composer/ pianist Bernd Lhotzky has provided her with a wonderful array of musical contexts. As Minichmayr says: “He got so deep into the meaning of each sonnet, his music made it different every time. And we talked a lot about the colour, the meaning of each poem.” The opening track, “Mistress Mine”, Sonnet 130 is a masterfully deft piece of gender-fluid irony. In the poem, a man is describing possibly the ugliest woman he has ever seen – while also declaring that she is the one he loves. Lhotzky gives us an acerbic version in that most male-led of dances, the tango, complete with bandoneon, in which the words are sung by...a woman. Minichmayr then gives a masterclass in how to end a song as she hits, holds and nails the words “false compare” with triumphant fearlessness. Throughout the course of the album, we are magically transported to new musical and emotional places. As Minichmayr says: “Through singing, through just doing it, I was able to find deep love, or deep sadness. I was really touched by it.” We are straight into the elegiac world of “Sin Of Self-Love”, or into world-weariness, tinged with an unmistakable irritation, of “Tired With All These”. And then, unforgettably, we land in the major-key contentment of “Mine Eye Hath Played The Painter”. One of the secrets to this album’s success is Lhotzky’s wish to find melodies which have a certain ease and straightforwardness about them. He says that he approaches all music – whether he is listening to it or writing it – with one simple and direct question: “What story is this telling me?” Lhotzky is known for his work in the field of early jazz, but the range here is far broader, with allusions to examples of fine songwriting: Brassens, Robert Plant, James Taylor... The collaboration between Minichmayr and Lhotzky had a very propitious start and has gone from strength to strength. They were invited to work together on a Dorothy Parker project in the Austrian spa town of Bad Schallerbach in the summer of 2019. Minichmayr had been booked to do readings, but was also keen to sing...Cole Porter’s “Just One of Those Things,” with its reference to Dorothy Parker in the first line. That worked out so well, it led Lhotzky to suggest a Shakespeare project to her which he had already embarked upon – it has been briefly glimpsed already on ACT, on one track of “Winter at Schloss Elmau”. The instrumentalists are a Munich based group named Quadro Nuevo, with Philipp Schiepek’s contribution a standout. As Lhotzky says: “He’s a phenomenal guitarist, and really young. With his acoustic guitar he brings us back to the origins, to Dowland's songs with lute. And the fact that he also plays electric jazz guitar provides a connecting link across the centu-ries.” And then there is bassist D.D. Lowka’s large-scale Charlie Haden-ish bass sound. “D.D. and Philipp are a dream team,” says Lhotzky. And reedsman Mulo Francel brings a whole range of colours from luscious contrabass clarinet to fluent jazz soloing on saxophones. Accordionist Andreas Hinterseher? “He’s just a phenomenon,” says Lhotzky, “he hardly said a thing in the sessions, but every take was perfect.” Bernd Lhotzky's piano playing, for example as he sets the scene for "Let not to the marriage" has a deliciously understated and laid-back eloquence and elegance. Bernd Lhotzky’s kaleidoscopic musical vision and Birgit Minichmayr’s instinct for mood-setting have combined trium-phantly in “As An Unperfect Actor”. In this “perfect ceremony of love’s rite,” they never seem to run out of joyous surprises for the listener.