Cologne Jazzweek: Theo Bleckmann / Julia Hülsmann Duo

In 2013, Berlin-based pianist Julia Hülsmann and New York-based German vocalist Theo Bleckmann collaborated for the first time. At the time, Hülsmann was commissioned by the Kurt Weill Fest in Dessau to work with Bleckmann and her quartet to shed new and different light on the American creative period of the German composer Weill from a jazz perspective. At that time, the focus was more on ballads that Weill had composed for various musicals. This allowed Hülsmann and Bleckmann to fully display their class in not pointing out the obvious in the songs, but rather to go between the notes and verses, as it were, with their improvisational exegesis of the musical material, thus bringing out the subtle, the previously unsung and unheard from Weill's songbook. Weill songs will certainly be in the repertoire again when the two perform as a duo at the Cologne Jazz Week. There will probably also be one or two Beatles songs to hear, or one or two original compositions by Hülsmann and Bleckmann. But no matter which songs the two will bring to the stage: They attach importance to delicate transparency as well as rapturous expression.