Duo

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34 years separate keyboard legend and icon of European avant-garde jazz Joachim Kühn, who was born in Leipzig in 1944, and Michael Wollny, an equally virtuosic pianist and forerunner in the new German scene, born in 1978. Wollny has never feigned his admiration, or rather his deference, for his celebrated elder, to the point that he made Kühn not only one of his main stylistic influences, but also the very subject of his graduate thesis. The two musicians, invited by their shared label ACT to record a concert together in 2009 (Live at Schloss Elmau), began to meet regularly in this minimalistic configuration in order to explore their elective affinities. Recorded at the Alte Oper Frankfurt, this new record, simply entitled Duo, comes fifteen years after their first meeting, providing a sort of overview of their journey together.

Having overcome any inhibitions that may have arisen at the beginning of their collaboration due the generation gap, the two pianists present a repertoire of great esthetic unity. Intertwining Kühn and Wollny’s own compositions with a cover of the fantastic Ornette Coleman piece “Somewhere”, the album constitutes undeniable proof of their complicity and almost osmotic mutual understanding. With a deep, intuitive, conversational intelligence, Kühn and Wollny carefully develop a melancholic and moonlit universe, interspersed with lyrical outbursts of an impressive intensity, as each musician summons his immense cultural knowledge of both jazz and classical music (from Schumann to Webern, as well as French impressionism and the mystic post-romanticism of Scriabin…) in order to melt down all of these influences into a present moment improvised in the same shared dialect. Consistently avoiding the egotistical temptation of ostentatious virtuosity, and rather investing all of their sensitivity and mastery of their instrument (as well as its sonoric palette, intimate dynamic, and orchestral dimension) into carving out a space within the sonoric material for the music to unfold, breathe, and thrive, these masters of improvisation have created one of the most beautiful piano jazz albums in recent years. © Stéphane Ollivier/Qobuz