Rolf Kühn (musician)

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Rolf Kühn (2017)

Rolf Kühn (born September 29, 1929 in Cologne ) is a German jazz clarinetist , composer and band leader. He is one of those jazz clarinetists who has developed his own style.

Live and act

His parents were Kurt and Grete Kühn, née Moses. They had met in Cologne, where their mother worked at the checkout in the department store; they married in 1929. His mother was Jewish, and her cigar business was destroyed during the Night of the Reichspogroms . Because his father did not want a divorce, he was excluded from the Reich Theater Chamber and had to work for the Todt Organization . His son Rolf grew up in Leipzig - Lindenau and learned to play the piano from 1937. At a young age he was also familiar with music theory and composition. In 1941 he was taught by Hans Berninger, who at that time was principal clarinetist in the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig. Because he was not allowed to attend music college as a so - called half - Jew , he was secretly taught by private tutors. He first got to know jazz through Jutta Hipp in 1947. Hipp played him her parents' house in a V-Disc by Benny Goodman before. At the age of 16 he played the piano in the Opera Ballet School. In 1946, at the age of 17, Kühn became a saxophonist and clarinetist at the newly founded Leipzig broadcaster of the Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk . As a soloist he played under Kurt Henkels in the Rundfunk-Tanzorchester Leipzig , the leading big band in the Soviet zone, together with the star trumpeter Horst "Hackl" Fischer and the drummer and later head of his own orchestra Fips Fleischer .

After a short stay with Eugen Henkel , Kühn became principal saxophonist in the RIAS dance orchestra in Berlin after 1950 . In 1954 Kühn was honored for the first time as “Best Clarinetist” at a European jazz competition and was to defend this prize in the following two years.

In 1956 Kühn moved to America , toured New York with Caterina Valente . It was there that he met Columbia Records producer John Hammond , who made it possible for the aspiring young artist to make his first record under his own name. He put together an accompanying group for him, with whom he u. a. was heard in New York's Birdland , Chicago's Blue Note and the Newport Jazz Festival . From 1958 to 1962 Kühn played in Benny Goodman's orchestra and - as the successor to Buddy DeFranco  - for a year and a half as principal clarinetist with Tommy Dorsey .

In 1962, Rolf Kühn returned to Germany, where he immediately became director of the NDR television orchestra in Hamburg . In addition to his work as an orchestra conductor, Kühn also acted with Albert Mangelsdorff and others as a soloist of the “German Allstars”, with whom he also undertook an extensive tour of South America. At the same time, from the 1960s onwards, numerous records were released as leader and sideman on renowned labels such as Polydor , Vanguard Records , Brunswick Records , Amiga (record label) , Intercord , Impulse! Records and of course MPS .

Since 1966, Rolf Kühn's 14 years younger brother, the pianist Joachim Kühn , who previously lived in Leipzig , was also in West Germany. His brother got him released from the GDR by means of an invitation to Vienna. Since then, the brothers have performed together again and again (initially produced by Joachim Ernst Berendt , then by Klaus Lorenzen ).

Since the 1960s, Rolf Kühn's musical spectrum has included classical jazz as well as free jazz and jazz rock . Since then, Kühn has increasingly turned to composing and conducting and has taken over the musical direction of various theaters, including the Berlin Theater des Westens .

From the end of the 1960s he began composing for films such as The Yellow House on Pinnasberg , Perrak , The Death Avenger of Soho and Dr. M strikes and legendary TV series like PS , Tatort and Derrick , but also occasionally recorded for library labels like Selected Sound. Rolf Kühn was married to the German actress Judy Winter .

The Kühn brothers are among the most prominent and successful German jazz musicians. The series of awards they have received over the past 40 years (e.g. the German Jazz Trophy 2018 for their life's work in 2018) is just as impressive as the large number of publications on which they can be heard individually or together.

In 2008 he founded the ensemble Rolf Kühn & Tri-O with Christian Lillinger , Ronny Graupe and Johannes Fink . Since then he has performed nationwide with this working band and continues to release new albums. Even as an almost 90-year-old, Kühn says he still practices 2 hours a day on his instrument.

Discographic Notes

Albums

Filmography (as composer, selection)

Awards

documentary

literature

Web links

Commons : Rolf Kühn  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "Just like Perry Robinson , the aforementioned Buddy DeFranco , Eddie Daniels or Theo Jörgensmann , who, independently of Kühn, owed a clarinet renaissance in jazz in the 80s, Rolf Kühn is one of the last of the class who» the stick with the holes "(cf. Bing Crosby / Louis Armstrong :" That's Jazz ") unmistakably able to play personally". In: Neues Deutschland , October 18, 2009.
  2. ^ Maxi Sickert: Clarinet Bird: Rolf Kühn - Jazz talk . 2009, p. 19
  3. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  4. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  5. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  6. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  7. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  8. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin, May 2017, p. 81.
  9. ↑ see Maxi Sickert's biography
  10. ↑ Melodies for Generations: Portrait of the clarinetist Rolf Kühn , Deutschlandfunk Jazzfacts November 17, 2016, accessed November 19, 2016
  11. ↑ Der Eternal Curious , Saarländischer Rundfunk, June 3, 2018, accessed June 3, 2018
  12. ↑ new album "Yellow + Blue" , MPS, accessed June 3, 2018
  13. ↑ http://www.rolf-kuehn.de/info_the_best_vinyl.php
personal data
SURNAME Bold, Rolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German jazz clarinetist, composer and band leader
DATE OF BIRTH September 29, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Cologne