Polytheistic Ensemble: SIGNALS FROM THE COOL

Matthias Ockert – guitar, electronics; Tomas Westbrooke – violin; Marie Schmit – cello; HP Ockert – trumpet, flugelhorn; Stefan Schönegg – bass; Dominik Mahnig – drums; Eve Cambreling – flute; Evgeni Orkin – bass clarinet; Olga Zheltikova – piano; Christoph Heeg – alto sax; Shin Minami – marimba, percussion

When Matthias Ockert (Editor's note: the POLYTHEISTIC ENSEMBLE leader) receives SIGNALS FROM THE COOL, it's meant programmatically as well.

His music processes sound influences from other jazz musicians. It's metrically and rhythmically complex, often danceable, as the two don't necessarily exclude each other. Its sound and melody are predominantly shaped by string instruments. It works with rock elements as well as aleatoric components.

It's carefully composed and balanced, but it doesn't need musicians to play what's on the sheet. It designs itself as a collective process that holds everyone accountable, doesn't leave anyone alone—not even in the solos, for which it repeatedly creates space—and forces everyone to listen closely.

Matthias Ockert's music not only sounds like jazz, it is jazz, but it renders any opposition between jazz and composition obsolete. And then there are the signals from the cold at the edge of the solar system. The Herschel Space Telescope has forwarded them, from a distance of several light minutes.

Matthias Ockert has processed them into sounds and mixed them into the music. They leave traces in it; we don't know and hear exactly what. But they're there. They don't disturb the order of the music. They're part of it. - Hans-Jürgen Linke

The electronic sounds are based on light data from the observation of trans-Neptunian objects by the Herschel Telescope, provided by the Max Planck Institute Germany in cooperation with Dr. Miriam Rengel. The CD production is supported by the Initiative Musik gemeinnützige Projektgesellschaft mbH with project funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media based on a resolution of the German Bundestag.

More information at www.polytheistic-ensemble.net / www.matthiasockert.de

Matthias Ockert

For composer and guitarist Matthias Ockert, there is no either/or: His polystylistic music draws from all current trends, such as contemporary music, jazz, rock, pop, and electronics. Algorithmic composition meets jazz improvisation, interactive electronics meet classical instruments, groove meets constructed forms, innovation meets academic tradition. Matthias Ockert is considered "such an illustrious figure between worlds that are not so far apart when embodied authentically by someone." (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung)

Matthias Ockert studied composition with Wolfgang Rihm, Sandeep Bhagwati, and Hanspeter Kyburz, and jazz guitar with Attila Zoller, Bill Connors, and Steve Khan in New York. His music is performed at international festivals and venues for contemporary music, such as the Lucerne Festival or the Warsaw Autumn.

He collaborates with musicians from the Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain, or the Berlin Philharmonic, as well as with jazz musicians like Emil Mangelsdorff, David Amram, Makaya McCraven, and Ed Byrne in concerts and CD productions in Europe and the USA.

He has been commissioned by the Munich Biennale for New Music Theater, the Zeitgenössische Oper Berlin, or the Ballet of the Baden State Theater Karlsruhe for stage works. He develops sound installations, such as for the Museum of Fine Arts Leipzig or the Schauwerk Sindelfingen in collaboration with the light artist rosalie. His works have been awarded numerous prizes, such as the 1st prize at the International Composition Competition for the Raum der Gläsernen Manufaktur Dresden.

In 2012, he founded the POLYTHEISTIC ENSEMBLE with a concert at ZKM Karlsruhe and combines contemporary composition, jazz, and electronics with video art to create a vibrant overall picture.

Press:

"...Between ear-pleasing melodiousness and biting rockiness, Zappaesque volatility, soloistic improvisation, tightly organized ensemble sound, jazzy atmosphere, and spherical splinters, there is a jewel shimmering in all possible colors, which indeed seems to be waving from another star..."

Klappe Auf 06/16

"Such differentiated and rich in timbre jazz rock with trumpet solo and violin trills is not heard every day."

Bad Alchemy (Rigobert Dittmann)

"Ockert's music is neither cool nor marked by formulaic abstraction. Rather, at the bottom of his highly complex, Zappaesque, and sometimes bizarre compositions, an energy flares up, the cause of which is particularly highlighted by Dominik Minami drumming like a brilliant whirlwind."

Jazz Podium 7-8/16 (Benno Bartsch)

"...hot, hot, hot"

Bad Alchemy (Rigobert Dittmann)

"An impressive tour de force, demanding and multilayered, but never exhausting"

Jazz thing 06/16 (Jan Paersch)