Johannes Berauer - Vienna Chamber Diaries Plus Strings (CD)

Release Date: 03/18/22

The Austrian composer returns to Basho with an exciting and expansive fusion of the jazz and contemporary classical worlds.

'I consider myself an ambassador between classical and jazz musicians, between composed and improvised music', says Austrian composer Johannes Berauer. His Vienna Chamber Diaries project has, until now, been characterised by intimate settings. Celebrating the tenth anniversary of the project in 2022, Berauer's latest instalment finds him thinking big in his most expansive work in the series to date. It features a string orchestra assembled in Vienna by cellist Florian Eggner alongside the core Vienna Chamber Diaries Ensemble. The core ensemble functions as a jazz group and includes Gwilym Simcock on piano, Wolfgang Muthspiel on guitar and Yuri Goloubev on bass.

Berauer describes Wolfgang Muthspiel as the 'patron' of the Vienna Chamber Diaries project. Muthspiel played on the first album as well as launching it on his record label. Bassist Yuri Goloubev is the musician who most links the two musical worlds, given his breadth of experience both as a jazz musician and as a classical bassist. Berauer has built an ongoing musical relationship with pianist Gwilym Simcock and saxophonist Klaus Gesing. The string section is drawn from the major orchestras and ensembles of Vienna and features two musicians who are also members of the core Vienna Chamber Diaries ensemble - violinist Johannes Dickbauer, also a 'hybrid' musician with experience as an improviser, and Florian Eggner.

The music on the album is divided into two parts, but these parts are interwoven to create contrast in texture, density and mood. There are five pieces with the full Vienna Chamber Diaries ensemble and string section interspersed with four small band pieces with varying instrumentation.

Berauer emphasises the importance of the recent birth of his son. The piece Florentin is directly inspired by this, but Berauer also suggests that this context informs the entire work, and imbues it with a sense of hope and anticipation for the future.