Favorites of the week: A jazz legend in the pub – culture

Jazz: Abdullah Ibrahim

Once a year, the South African pianist Abdullah Ibrahim gives a concert in his neighboring village for his birthday in October. This year it’s on the 14th and 15th, this weekend. And because he lives in Chiemgau, it is in Söllhuben, where it is Hirzinger Inn There is one of those concert barns that every now and then bring world class music to the countryside throughout Bavaria. It is already his 89th birthday, so he has experienced and made a lot of history both in his homeland and in exile. At home in Cape Town, as a teenager in the late 1940s, he became a professional musician under his nickname “Dollar Brand”, found jazz at an early age and then soon went into exile. He and his then wife Sathima Benjamin simply never returned from a tour with the musical “King Kong” in 1962. They moved to Zurich and performed at the Africana jazz club for two years. There she discovered Duke Ellington, who became her mentor. This was followed by New York, encounters with the pioneers of bebop such as Thelonious Monk, and soon solo, trio and ensemble recordings for Brand, and in 1968 the conversion to Islam and the new name.

He then returned to his homeland again and again. In 1974, for example, he recorded the piece “Mannenberg” there, a hymn for which he pressed rice nails onto the felt hammers of the piano so that it sounded like Marabi, the music they played in the barracks in the townships. The piece was so catchy, with its melody balancing a spirit of optimism and melancholy, that it soon became the unofficial anthem of the anti-apartheid movement.

Ibrahim has been living with his wife in a converted farmhouse in Chiemgau for more than ten years. During a visit there, he said that the area with the mountains reminded him of his home on the Cape. And the scene at Hirzinger, where people perform who take folk music very seriously beyond all the beer tent clichés, is very similar to the jazz scene in South Africa, which has always cultivated the music of their grandparents. He now loves his birthday concerts at the Hirzinger so much that he played there even without an audience during the pandemic. This makes for a gorgeous album “Solotude” become. If you want to know what breathtaking evenings await you on October 14th and 15th, you can take a listen. Andrian Kreye

Pop song: “Sitting is the Opposite of Standing”

People do a lot of things worth telling, they love and lie, and then they write songs about all of that, but one thing always falls behind: sitting. It’s not sexy, it’s not healthy, it’s more like the white bread of postures, but the equator-wide trend doesn’t stop. And while a few health avant-gardists are cracking their spines in front of height-adjustable desks, a viral hit is spreading nothing but positive things Message: “Sitting is the Opposite of Standing”. That’s the name of the song that TJ Mack posted on Tiktok in mid-September. Over two and a half million views in less than two weeks. Behind it is the fabulous comedian Brian Jordan Alvarez, who sings in the video with a summery reggae-dub intonation: Sitting is the opposite of standing. Sitting is the opposite of running around. Sitting is a wonderful thing. Opera singers, country musicians were already covering. More is to be expected, what can you say? The man has a point. Marlene Knobloch

Crime thriller: “In the beginning is death”

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Berlin and also Babylon – but in the present. The Spanish writer Jesús Cañadas has lived in the German capital for years. He is a merciless observer of all facets of Berlin, from the brutal refugee parallel worlds to the ridiculous hipster hangouts in Neukölln. His crime novel has the somewhat pathetic title “In the beginning is death” (Suhrkamp Verlag, 440 pages, 17 euros). But you shouldn’t let that deter you. The story is a clean one Hardboiled-Thriller about a young inspector who is assigned to his first big case: A student has disappeared from a boarding school, only a bloody tooth was found in her room – and a puzzling message in an old copy of “We Children from Bahnhof Zoo” . If only the “crime scene” were always like this masterful crime novel. David Steinitz

Documentary: “Heaven Can Wait”

How different pop songs sound when old people sing them: “What should we dream about, the way we are?” Frida Gold or a “I feel good!” uttered with conviction. The fact that the singers put the experiences of a long life into the songs, the knowledge of dwindling opportunities and approaching death, gives the lyrics depth. Not every note has to be right: “It’s about expression,” says the director of the Hamburg senior choir “Heaven Can Wait”, which Sven Halfar portrays in his documentary. The singing is touching because it expresses experiences and feelings. The choir’s performances are also a professional, rousing show.

Seventy is the minimum age, the oldest choir member is over ninety. Most of them are familiar with physical limitations, and one of them is crying about the death of his wife. But the horrors of old age are not too dominant in the film. Not because they are being pushed out, but there are other things too, and everyone knows where the journey is leading anyway.

If you are old, then at least as hungry for life, often cheerful and idiosyncratic as these singers. Membership in the choir, rehearsals and performances together – on “real” stages, not in a retirement home – act like an elixir of life. “I couldn’t have imagined that you could still have so much fun at that age,” says one woman.

Halfar sketches mini-portraits of the singers, looking back at long, very different lives. Some have experienced happy partnerships or marriages over decades, have traveled a lot, and one has a basement full of self-painted pictures. Others have put aside or ignored their dreams and desires and only feel liberated in old age.

Again and again, the old remind the young to live in the now and to use the time that everyone has. The choir’s program also includes a song by Udo Lindenberg: “Take your life and don’t let it go, because all you have is just this one.” A feel-good film in the best sense of the word. Martina Knoben

Football book: “You’ll Never Sing Alone”

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In 1978, the German Football Association was miles ahead of the US idea of ​​having pop stars in the Super Bowl halftime show: the prominent home organ entertainer Franz Lambert was taken to the team camp for the World Cup in Argentina. Lambert played to the accompaniment during training and in the stadium at German games. After the 2-3 disgrace against Austria, the experiment was never repeated again. It’s just one of the countless anecdotes and historical information that Gunnar Leue tells in the great book “You’ll Never Sing Alone – How music came into football” (Ventil, 256 pages, 28 euros). The panorama ranges from club anthems to commentary songs, from singing footballers to ultra choirs. The relationship between sport and pop is no surprise; it is documented and dissected here. Joachim Hentschel