Julia Hülsmann Quartett

The German pianist and composer Julia Hülsmann is regarded as the grande dame of German jazz. She plays very subtle jazz and has already released a considerable number of albums on the ECM label.

The pianist and composer's award-winning quartet - her first album "Not Far From Here" won the 2021 German Jazz Award for the best instrumental album (national) - reaches the next level with its successor "The Next Door". After raving about the quartet's first album, we are now amazed at how graceful yet powerful, how transparent yet dense, how minimalist yet complex and, above all, how diverse a quartet album can be in terms of composition and energy.

Unpretentious. That's the first thing that strikes you when you put the Julia Hülsmann Quartet's new album The Next Door into the player of your choice. Then: organic. As if every note, every sound, has to be exactly as it is by nature. And: Open. Because that's what this quartet is, a trio that has grown around Julia Hülsmann (piano), Marc Muellbauer (bass) and Heinrich Köbberling (drums), which has been playing together for nineteen years and has always enjoyed inviting the odd guest to join in, but only found its true quartet form with tenor saxophonist Uli Kempendorff.

Kempendorff not only succeeds in wresting an edge or two from the ethereal trio sound, which always floats slightly above things and has its head in the clouds, but also in grounding it. Music that is very tangible, just like the girls and boys next door. So the quartet's second album together goes one door further. After all, they often rehearsed together during the lockdown period, played numerous concerts and travelled a lot, which has now culminated in an even more intense collaboration. Although the quartet's debut was already grassroots democratic - after all, all members contributed their own pieces to the record - the distribution of responsibilities is now even more open. Fixed roles? There are none.

From epic flow to highly complex structures that can only be understood by members of the household, through which the saxophone invites you on a kind of exploratory walk, to hypnotic, Afrobeatesque grooves and including Hülsmann's characteristic cover piece, as always arranged with huge respect for the original: the pianist and composer's award-winning quartet - the first album "Not Far From Here" won the 2021 German Jazz Award for the best instrumental album (national) - also reaches the next level with its successor "The Next Door".