Jazz Funk at its finest! In his 40-plus years as a vibraphonist, he has produced a string of soul and funk classics, like ‘We Live In Brooklyn Baby’ and ‘Everybody Loves the Sunshine,’which have arguably made him the second-most sampled musician in hip-hop, after James Brown. Joined by Mark Adams (Keys), Ray Gaskins (Saxophone), Donald Nicks (Bass), Troy Miller (Drums), John Pressley (Vocals) he will perform his legendary hits, as well as new songs.
Sanada Maitreya & The Nudge Nudge play Avo Session
Sananda Maitreya presents his music as ‘Post Millennium Rock’. Its main elements are heart and soul, its nature is passion, courage and curiosity and itknows no rules except to lead the listener back to his heart. Sananda started his career as Terence Trent D’Arby. At the Avo Session he proudly presents his new music, the albums ‘Angels & Vampires’, ‘Nigor Mortis’ and ‘The Sphinx’, with his two-man-orchestra: The Nudge Nudge.
Joe Jackson plays Avo Session
Post punk, pop, swing, jazz, latin, and classical: in the course of his 40-year career, Joe Jackson has always tried out whatever tickled his fancy. He took it for granted that he would never become a big star for the masses. Joe Jackson is an expert in his field and a master of his art who delights the music gourmets. At the Avo Session he performs with Graham Maby (Vocals, Bass) and Dave Houghton (Vocals, Drums, Percussion, Loops).
Element of Crime play Avo Session
The Berlin dialect is known as being extremely direct and full of slang, yet somehow it is still endearing. Element of Crime have become a chanson-rock institution with their eccentric, poetic wordplay and slightly melancholic melodies.
Gino Paoli plays Avo Session
The Italian canzone needed new input, but what kind? Gino Paoli found the answer by studying italianità closely and critically before he co-founded the ‘Genovese School’ in the fifties, laying the foundation for today’s cantautori scene. Today Paoli is the honoured godfather of all cantautori. He plays peaceful, melancholically beautiful songs that are carried by his sheer lightness. Italianità has been redefined.
Tom Principato & Powerhouse play Avo Session
Legendary singer and guitarist Tom Principato gives us blues at its best: relaxed and down-to-earth. He has performed on dozens of blues recordings and is still making ground breaking American music enjoyed by fans the world over.
Mariza plays Avo Session
Music is language. Nowhere else is that more obvious than in Portuguese, where a single word became the key to an entire culture of music: ‘Saudade’. Happiness mixed with sadness is the blues of Portugal and Brazil, where Mariza also lived for a while, influenced too by the musical rhythms of that country’s popular music.
Lang Lang & Nikolaus Harnoncourt: Mission Mozart
In spring 2014 the Vienna Musikverein turned into a music laboratory, a recording studio and into a venue for a very exciting enounter of two seemingly very different artists: Nikolaus Harnoncourt, well-known as an intellectual musician who came to attention as a period-practice and Lang Lang, a superstar, a pianist of stunning virtuosity and freewheeling music instincts, together with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra record the Mozart Piano Concertos No. 17 K453 in G major and No. 24 K491 in C minor. This documentary is a revealing insight into the creative process of two of the most distinctive and influential musicians in the world today.
Vivaldi: The Four Seasons Recomposed By Max Richter – The Berlin Concert
Vivaldi’s Four Seasons may be the most widely heard piece of classical music ever composed. As the composer Max Richter suggests, “The piece is part of the musical landscape, and a part of my daily life. I hear it in supermarkets, and it’s always turning up in TV ads.” He has approached his “Vivaldi Recomposed”-project as an admirer of Vivaldi, but no less importantly, as a composer. “Anything that a composer writes is part of a conversation with music that has gone before,” he says. Max Richter’s co-conspirator in the documentary on this project is Daniel Hope, the British violinist; and the orchestra “l’arte del mondo” with violinist Werner Ehrhardt, its artistic director.
Mirella Freni – A Life Devoted to Opera
Mirella Freni is one of the most remarkable soprano singers in the world of opera. She has been winning over audiences for half a century with her ever fresh and youthful vocals and a voice quality which remains undiminished. In 2010, the year of her 75th birthday and the 55th anniversary of her stage debut, she receives the MIDEM Classical Award in the category ‘Lifetime Achievement’. The portrait shows Mirella Freni during a Singing Class at the Centro Universale del Bel Canto (CUBeC) in her hometown of Modena. Interviews with colleagues and friends such as tenor Plácido Domingo complete the portrait.