Paul Heller invites Judy Niemack, Fay Claassen, Jeff Cascaro & Norbert Gottschalk

Der VVK ist beendet. Es sind noch Tickets (Stehplätze) an der Abendkasse erhältlich.

What has not all been written and presumed - about the allegedly tense relationship between instrumentalists and vocalists, between "musicians" on the one hand and singers on the other. Undisputed: There have always been prejudices and they have been cultivated for a long time. And not only in jazz. Even the not-so-small fraction of double talents has hardly been able to change anything about this, about protagonists who use larynx and hands equally. Not to mention the fact that some vocalists use their voices instrumentally and, of course, see them as "instruments", while instrumentalists strive to give their tone and playing a vocal quality. Long gone are those days and years when singers at big band concerts were assigned only a short guest role with two or three songs as a decorative, singing and swinging "accessory". Even situations in which the instrumentalists exercise great restraint and more or less sulk as pure accompanists of beautiful voices are not passé, but only a part of everyday jazz music.

Time for a Vocal Summit that clears up old clichés and stereotypes. Paul Heller (who is married to a singer - the side note is permitted here -) has invited four excellent vocalists for Next Level Jazz - to put a possible gender discussion to one side: two women and two men. The American Judy Niemack, who passes on all her experiences and knowledge and today teaches singing in Berlin as the first jazz professor in Germany. The Dutch Fay Claassen, one of Europe's most convincing representatives of American vocal art, is in international demand for workshops and master classes. And two of Germany's best representatives of the subject: Norbert Gottschalk, teacher at several music colleges, singer and guitarist/trumpet player, and Jeff Cascaro, professor in Weimar, singer and trumpet player, who sums up his credo so succinctly: "I have never distinguished between jazz, soul and blues, I am a musician. Period." The following applies to all four of them: they are singers and musicians. Period.