with the new album "Closer" as part of the 24th Ahrenshooper Jazzfest
Harmony and tension, gentleness and strength - contrasts are rarely as tangible and close as in a couple. The two ECHO Jazz Award winners Nils Wülker and Arne Jansen invite us to their duo project in an active dialog between the two musicians, in constant give and take, listening and communicating, demanding and encouraging. Their album 'Closer' reached an incredible 15th place in the cross-genre German charts immediately after its release at the beginning of February - a small accolade for a jazz album, and an instrumental one at that.
Wülker and Jansen were already able to demonstrate their almost blind understanding when making music together at the JazzNights "The Art Of The Duo", generating great enthusiasm from press and audience alike. In the fall of 2023, the two colleagues, who have also been close friends for many years, will bring 'Closer' to the stage live with their own tour.
In their program, they tell exciting stories with new original compositions as well as interpretations from the repertoire of the two leaders and cover versions of some of their favorite pop and rock songs, from Nine Inch Nails to Ry X to The Blue Nile. With every note they capture the listener, accompanying them like good friends on a journey through new and exciting soundscapes. At times empathic and intimate, at others cinematic and atmospherically dense, from the ultimate reduction in duets to an almost orchestral sound, the two exceptional musicians explore their common ground.
exceptional musicians explore their similarities and live out their idiosyncrasies. It could hardly get any closer.
Trumpeter Nils Wülker and his guitarist colleague Arne Jansen have known each other for well over twenty years, and have been making music together for almost fifteen of them. In addition to their enormous artistic quality, they have always been united by their love of improvisation, this immediate creativity that allows them to define the moment in their reactions and interactions. Back in 2019, Wülker and Jansen played a Germany-wide duo tour under the name 'Closer'. "Only friends can do it like this" praised the press on the occasion of their concentrated joy of playing, recognizing "weightless jazz dialogues" as well as "virtuosity and balladesque calm", also because they added plenty of effects and loop stations to their main instruments in this context.
With 'Closer', the seventh album on which the two can be heard together, they now bring this matter of the heart to the point.
A real experience in which you can participate directly just by listening!
