Subject : interview 2.part

Warta Jazz (WJ) :

First, what about you interested with jazz and play this music at beginning?

Gunter Hampel (GH) :

I am born August 31, 1937.in germany.When I was 8 , end of world war II ,

american troops came into my hometown(Goettingen) and freed us from the

Nazi-dictatorship. I played piano and accordeon at that time, running with it

to the fire camps of the GI troops and started to jam with a black

GI-guitar-player. On his American-forces Radio Network AFN I heard Louis

Armstrong for the first time in my life. I did not understand a word of what

he was singing, but he talked to me. He turned me on to Jazz, and from that

moment on, I started to play it. Whatever i DID TURNED OUT TO BE in the

Jazzlanguage.I think Louis Armstrong turned us all on, he still is.

My father was a great piano and violinplayer and my first teacher.My next

piano teacher found out, that I was also a composer and was smart enough to

develop that gift in my, from the first lesson on.My Grandfather was a

multi-instrumentalist and composer, mostly of german folklore aND dance music

( that stuff you play, when you have a wedding or traditional folk-dances and

celebrations of the season.)

My father first did not like me to turn into Jazz, because he first did not

understand it, but when he came to one of my first dance-concerts he danced

to our swinging stuff and his face broadened up and I could see, he was proud

of me. He said later : Your music makes me dance. It lifts me up while I

dance. ( He did not know that we call that SWING) but he understood it his

way.He came to a lot of my gigs, because he could go to the girls and dance

with them. Made him feel important. In those days, people danced to our music

and we liked that too.

WJ :

Who was musician who most influence ?

GH :When you are young and start to play an instrument, you have so many

musicians influence you. Everyone who played a clarinet,vibraphone,saxophone

in Jazz or in any other music started to influence me from the beginning

on.WeJazzmen learn from each other. That never stops. You can always learn

more, new ways of playing and performing. It adds to what you already know.ay

be it helps our readers to be familiar with the great jazzmen who

influenenced me :

(clarinet:)Jimmy Noone,Johnny Dodds,Benny Goddman, Edmond Hall,Sidney Bechet,

Pee Wee Russel,George Lewis,(vibraphone) Lionel Hampton, Terry Gibbs, Red

Norvo,Milt Jackson,Lem Whinchester,Walt Dickerson,Teddy Charles,Bobby

Hutcherson,(saxophones:Benny Carter,Lester Young,Coleman Hawkins,Ben

Webster,Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan,John Coltrane,Eric Dolphy (he turned me on

to the bassclarinet)but as I said before: as a musician you get turned on by

everyone, who is playing meaningfull music, so I could name the whole

jazzbook.

But there is more: I am a composer, so I started to analyse and understand

the different styles and achievements of composeres like Benny Carter,Duke

Ellington, the further more reaching concepts of the incredible Benny Goodman

Quartet with Lionel Hampton,Gene Krupa,Teddy Wilson ( that was the first

Group who could play just anything they wanted, if people call our music Free

Jazz, these guys !!!)the bebop concepts of Charly Parker/Dizzy Gillespie, or

the pianoless quartetts of Gerry Mulligan, Art Blakey, Lenny Tristano,

Thelonious Monkl,Eric Dolphy, Charles Mingus.

But I also lived through the achievements of our european classical music,

and its evolutionaries like Richard Wagner,Bela Bartok from hungary, Arnold

Schoenberg,Alban Berg,Webern, thos guys developed a whole new universe for me

to use and improvise in it.....free tonal spaces , 12 equal notes and

everything in between...

WJ :

What was you reason plays some instrument and to become multi-

instrumentalist ?

GH :Musicians are a strange breed, I tell you. You fall in love with woman,

men,nature,god,the universe, but you also fall in love with an accustic music

instrument . Your heart just starts to jump when you see or hear a clarinet,

or vibraphone, or saxophone, or flute, or trumpet or trombone or violin or

bass or whatever, specially, when you have an incredible master expressing

him/herself through it.

TYhough a human being meets an incredible amount of people in his/her life.

But it is basically only 3,4 times you really fall in love. I mean REALLY.

And when you play music like me, the need for different expressions asks for

more than just one instrument. Because as much horizon one instrument has, it

is limited, so an additional instrument, give you an additional horizon of

expressions.

WJ :

What first led you to become a professional musician and chose committed to

free jazz and improvised music ?

The category called Free Jazz came up in the public, because someone - who

knows who that was- took the expression from Ornette Coleman's LP" Free Jazz"

And since that time veryone, including upcoming generations of musicians,

fans, writers got the stupid impression, that free jazz is something where

you just go out and play ANYTHING. When I play with young jazzmusicians, who

are well trained musicians, having studied years on music conservatories,

with teachers, to learn how to play, to study and study and study. When I

play with them and hit the free sections, there is always hell braking out.

They think, and that is important, they have this idiotic idea in their head,

now is freedom time, now i hit everything with what i got.

I play instruments like the flute,bassclarinet,vibraphone, the loudness of

those instruments is very limited, so I get pushed out of the way, I get to

be stepped on, I get killed. That happens with musicians who I hire to play

with me.

Amazing, isn't it ?

The other variation of this is, when i play with musicians who amplify their

instruments. The worst cases are the bassists. they kill my sound, specially

for the basscl and the vibes.

But there always the exceptionally ones who listen, and I stick with those.

Back to the free jazz word which has totally mistified and falsely

categorised what my generation is doing.

My experience of freer sounds go back to when I was 5 years old. When I used

to play the piano I sometimes just hit the keys and listened to the sound of

the piano, damper down. That opened up the space in which the note or notes

were sounding. The overtones of all the other strings echoed and extended

that one note into a whole universe. But that was just the start of

experiencing and studying different venues of experiences.

I am just a man who composes, arranges sounds. I give to the world what I

hear, what I like, what I love, what I do not like etc. i write a

composition, or sketch out a manual how i want us approach certain areas.

But when we play we listenb to each other.Yu 've got to listen to each other

even harder then when you play standards, and act and react and play with

what the other players are setting up. That only goes best in teamwork, or

when you play for the first time with each othewr, when you are a respectfull

person.

so, developing concepts and continuation of the jazzmusic made me develop my

artistry, I helped with my stuff to evolute the music, called jazz or

whatever.

What made me to choose making music as my profession ? Because I like to do

that, thats what I can do best. I talked to a taxi driver yesterday , when I

arrived in New York,who was from Kalkutta,India, he said, that gift comes

from god, to be a musician. Just like that. God gives me a kick in my ass and

says : Here, and you...you become a ..o.k. you become a musician. o.k. I

agree. Something like that is happening with people like us. Somewhere you

get an extra portion of phantasy or creativity, or feeling, or sensibility or

just sheere crazyness ( I mean that to be a creative, farseeing outness) to

do things out of the ordinary, because you feel that inside of you.

I can also just simple say: In the year 1958 I started to become a

PROFESSIONAL

Jazzmusician. I already got payed for playing music in 1953, but I was still

home and in school.

And I did not get involved in playing free jazz, i developed my own concepts

of music which was then put by journalists into the category of free jazz. I

helped to shape what that word means. My band in Germany, the

"Heartplants"Quintet wa s the first band in Europe to come up with something

so new, because we wanted to do that. Our big influences at that time was the

Charly Parker-Dizzy Gillespie-Bud Powell-Charles Mingus-Max Roach band from

Toronto. There wasn't even oRNETTE coleman around then. We just used our own

heritage, the great european music, the great afro-american-european music

called Jazz, to do what each generation is doing, creating it's own stuff.

We knew at the time, how important our creations would stand out in time as

the missing link between the tradition and the NEXT.

WJ :

What about you reason formed Birth Records at beginning and what Birth

Records vision ?

GH :As a composer I do have an incredible output of writing my own

compositions. Today I am writing my composition Nr.997. But I also have at

least the same amount of sketches, never completed compositions.It is clearly

understood, that no record company in the world is publishing them all. So I

am producing my stuff for any record company who likes to buy a production

from me, as is, or if I have invested a lot of money and the outcome is

something like the "8th of July 1969" I publish that on my own label BIRTH

RECORDS.The Vision is the music, now and for things to come.I am doing my own

evolution, because I am writing original stuff. I am not trying to copy the

music which is around to make money. I am using my BIRTH outlet to produce

music, which is coming from my heart. If I make some money so I can continue

it is very appreciated. There are music lovers, worldwide, who like us

playing from our heart, and that is the music, which is what this world needs

to continue. The commercial music You hear from the commercial Record

companies destroys brains,minds,organs and hearts, the world needs people

like me to have a balance. The only way to get through is to publish and play

the music, as is.So my BIRTH outlet is at least a little shelter, where I can

publish the music, as we musicians like to play it.

It is up to you, yes I mean you, who reads this, YOU. Make up your mind and

learn about the great things in life.WAKE UP.

WJ :

I think first release of Birth s The 8th July 1969 was of one important

free jazz albums, you plays with important European and American free jazz

musicians at the time !

GH :We were just starting to catch up with our own potential. At the time

not many people had heard of Gunter Hampel, Anthony Braxton, Jeanne Lee,

Willem Breuker or Steve McCall.

Also the concept of throwing 3 european and 3 afro american musicians

together is like renewing the Birth of Jazz concept again. Renewing the

sources as Steve McCall used to say.

And every new composition is like the birth of a new child. It grows and

grows everytime I perform it and shows what it is capable of. Shows a

growing character.

A new Birth. Jeanne Lee introduced me to the YIN/YAN sign which became my

label sign.

WJ :

How did Galaxie Dream Band come about ?

GH :New York 1972. My unit ,the Gunter Hampel Trio with Jeanne Lee voice and

Perry Robinson clarinet, was playing the loft-scene, and everytime we

performed 30 -4o musicians wanted to sit in, play with us, so I always had a

tross of musicians who followed us wherever we went.I had a series of

nightstands at the Theater for the new city, where we played everynite with

up to 45 musicians. I was writing day and night new tunes, we met and

rehearsed. We played at Steve Bernbachs Center for the extension of

consciousness, at Sam River's loft rivbea, at the Slugs, at the JazzGallery

at privat homes(lofts) One night we were performing/playing in a penthouse,

open ceilings, sky visible above us, and I just said to Jeanne : It feels

like I just travelled throughout the whole Galaxy.We were about 2o people ,

playing and Jeanne said, this is a dream to have a band like this. So there

you have it, GALAXIE DREAM BAND.aND WE STAYED TOGETHER FOR MORE THAN 2O yEARS.

WJ :

You re playing with some talented young jazz musicians in your groups Next

Generation . Do you want this groups to become like Galaxie Dream Band or

have different vision ?

GH :iN nEXT gENERATION we build up on the concepts of the music, I had

developed in the Galaxie dream Band, The experiences of playing in a team,

one for all and all for one. NEXT GENERATION IS MADE from musicians, who

joined me, when they were 17,18,19 years old. This is not 1972 it is 2ooo.

The current generation likes to dance. Hey, thats what I did when I was

17-2o. As I had pointed out before, they used to dance to our Jazz back in

the 5o's. Why not dance to us now.

Actually, the GALAXIE DREAM BAND had carloads of people following us on our

tours,DANCING to our free stuff. Jack Gregg the georgeous bass player and

human being was dancing on stage, we all were and are moving.

I love the NEXT GENARATION, today we are doing all sorts of things, we are

developing our own music again. It took us 5 years to perform everywhere, now

they are starting to catch up on that enormous band NEXT GENERATION has

it's own rules and evolution. I will be publishing more and more our "live"

performances on CD

from my different bands.All I need is time and money to do that.

I also have an incredible TRIO, with young geniusses Christian Weidner sax,

and Gerrit Juhnke on drums ( 2 members of NEXT GENERATION), or I have been

playing a lot with my HEARTPLANTS QUINTET a lot these days.

Each band developes its own sound and music and builds up on the achievements

of the bands before, because it is me who is carrying the torch.

WJ :

You are a soloist, any different playing solo with the groups or duos ?

GH :In a group the energy of a band is carried by the amount of its members.

In SOLO playing, it has ALL to come from myself. In a bandplaying you are

very much influenced by what the other musicians are playing. A lot of ideas

get passed around. In Solo you deal with yourself ALL THE TIME.

I am more free to my decisions

WJ :

What about your concert in Indonesia with Goethe Institute at 1978 ?

GH :I was on tour in Asia for the GOETHE INSTITUT AND WE HIT

dJAKARTA,bANGUNG,was it Surabaja (?) I had a great time in Indonesia, it is

one of the places I would like to settle down. A land which can harvest rice

4 times a year ? Where you have the great music in Bali and have all this

incredible people with this great vibrations and smiling faces ?

Before we played in Djakarta, someone was sitting on the roof top and burned

all sorts of secret stuff to keep the rain away ? I helped him playing my

MORNING SONG ( from 8th of July 1969) because it does the same thing. I can

play it on a rainy day, and the sun will come out.

Furthermore we had to wait starting the concert because a spirit was

inhabiting the tree in the garden of the open air concert.People were

gathering around the tree and trying to convince the spirit to leave the tree.

WJ :

I look you re busy musician especially with your tour or concert at all

around the world, what tour and concert important for jazz musician ?

GH:That depends on the aspect you are having. I pointed out, that I love,

that I want to play music. I am a musician. I want to go to a place , where

they let me play. And if people in Europe, in the USa, in Southamnerika, in

Canada,in Africa, in Asia or wherever want me to come and play music for

them, I come and do that.Someone has to do the arrangements of paying and

organizing that properly, though.

Another aspect is the more any of my bands play together the better the

bands get, it is as if layers are stripped away between us, which keep

unfolding inner layers of more closeness of being together. You call that

teamwork. You have the same effect in the world of sports, a good soccer team

etc. EWe also need to make money to pay our bills. If it takes travelling,

o.k.

One other aspect is, the more you get around and see the world ,meet

different countries, people, have encounters, the more your horizone opens

.., the more the music grows......

GH :

WJ :

Let s touch about your new album and what do you plan for the future ?

GH :The 8th of September 1969 is an example again, how to bring people

together from Europe and from the afro american Jazzpeople here in New York.

Christian on the saxophone and Nils Wogram on the trombone are 2 people who

could be the future for the european Jazzevolution.If they survive. Time will

tell. The music stretches the whole Jazzhistory as I have played it.It is a

very great album and I was glad, I made it. Right now I am setting up a new

recording in the next weeks and I will let you know what of my many

productions I can publish. The world changes fast, so do my concepts. The

more I learn, the more I know I do know nothing.

I plan to come to Japan and will see, if it is possible to come to Indonesia

as well.

Ajie will let everyone know how to reach him and me.

I wish you all always good luck, in whatever you are trying to do.

Yours

GUNTER HAMPEL , nEW yORK, nOV 15, 2000