Gerd Dudek Quartett feat. Manfred Schoof & Paul Heller

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In times in which productivity and creative potential are measured almost exclusively by the product of the sound carrier (especially by those under his own name), he may seem like an artist from times long gone. But Gerd Dudek can live with it: although there is no shortage of records and radio recordings in which he is involved, the saxophonist has been present for decades, and for a jazz musician that means first of all: on stage.

Dudek, whose first professional years were determined mainly by the big bands of the SFB and Kurt Edelhagen, always moves outside the orchestral corset between modal playing and free jazz. A non-verbal storyteller par excellence who elegantly integrates his influences into his play: Stan Getz, above all John Coltrane, but also an Albert Ayler.

The musical gesture was and is at the same time an attitude that also determines the organisational form: Although most of Dudek's activities do not run under his name, almost all formations, whether musically free or not, with or without a nominal leader, see themselves as a collective. Be it the early Manfred Schoof Quintet, the Globe Unity Orchestra, groups around Albert Mangelsdorff, Wolfgang Dauner and Peter Brötzmann, the European Jazz Ensemble, Third Eye and many others. As much as one experiences him as a soloist of the very first rank, Dudek is a "team player", an artistic authority, freed from the urge and compulsion of notorious self-portrayal. Even if he is standing at the front edge of the stage, he is never in the foreground.

When you see the outwardly young man entering the room in his always friendly and reserved manner, you can hardly believe that he is celebrating his eightieth birthday in the meantime. And this impression continues as he begins to play.

We celebrate Gerd Dudek with another veteran of Cologne, German and European jazz history, the trumpeter Manfred Schoof, with long-time band colleagues from the cathedral city such as Martin Sasse, Martin Gjakonovski and Hendrik Smock (the line-up that also recorded Gerd's album "Out Of This World"). And with you, dear audience, who have been celebrating the jubilee for many years listening and always knew what it had in Gerd Dudek. And has continued.