Volker Kriegel - Two Concerts, Pt. 1 (Live, Lagos, 1979) (2019)

The digitalisation of Volker Kriegel's personal tape archive (1943 - 2003) not only secures the musical heritage of one of the great musicians and pioneers of jazz rock in Germany, but has also led to three publications to date: In January 2019 MIG-Music released the albums MILD MANIAC, SCHÖNE AUSSICHTEN and BITON GROOVES. Known as well as unknown facets of the music of Volker Kriegel became audible again in as optimal a sound as possible, enriched with rare or previously unreleased bonus material. With these
recordings, another chapter is opened and two rousing concert recordings from two very different phases of Volker Kriegel's career are released: one in 1979 with the Mild Maniac Orchestra and guests in Lagos, Nigeria, and the other in 1990 with his last
band in Bochum.

In 1979 Volker Kriegel was firmly established in the German and European jazz rock scene. Under the aegis of the Goethe-Institut, he toured eleven West and East African countries with his Mild Maniac Orchestra + guests at the beginning of 1979

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During the inspection of Kriegel's personal tape archive, the recordings of the Africa tour were found on a total of 15 tapes with around 30 hours of concert recordings!

Of

the available recordings, this evening of two concerts in Lagos showed the most convincing playing and recording quality

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Time leap into 1990: Volker Kriegel plays with a new band in Bochum. Only keyboarder Thomas Bettermann has remained from the old Mild Maniac Orchestra. The new members are saxophonist Christof Lauer and the rhythm section consisting of bassist Michael Schürmann and drummer Thomas Alkier. Although the band played together from 1987 to 1993, Volker Kriegel's last career phase as bandleader is documented only by his only studio album "Palazzo Blue" (1987), which was much more "jazzy" and featured longer solo passages and more extensive improvisations than in the days of the Mild Maniac Orchestra. The recordings from Bochum are the perfect live counterpart. Volker Kriegel, as "Primus inter Pares", naturally forms the centre of the action, in which the individual talents of his fellow musicians could fully unfold: Christof Lauer as saxophonist with his powerful, expressive playing, Thomas Bettermann as soloist and sensitive accompanist of Kriegel and Michael Schürmann and Thomas Alkier as perfectly coordinated rhythm team.