Actually it should have just been a James Last parody, the “Sexadelic Dance Party” that guitarist Sigi Schwab recorded in 1969 together with soundtrack composer Manfred Hübler. In fact, that album wasn’t even suitable as a parody because it was simply hardly heard. Until 1997, Quentin Tarantino used the song “The Lions And The Cucumber” from that collaboration for the soundtrack of his feature film “Jackie Brown”.
Schwab viewed his late global success primarily as a significant financial injection that once again secured his independence. His hit “My Love Is A Tango” from the soundtrack to the television series “Anna” may have contributed a lot to this independence. At that time, the director played him a Madonna CD and said: “I need something like that.” Schwab, who, according to his own admission, had already recorded 15,000 individual tracks as a studio musician, promptly played him something in the desired style.
The string virtuoso called it “making a living,” in contrast to the music he played out of his own enthusiasm. This could happen in a duet with fellow guitarist Peter Horten, in a big band or with jazz musicians like Chris Hinze and Jasper van’t Hof. Schwab was just as fond of classical music as he was of jazz music. In 1967 he handed over compositions by Bach and Almeida to pop music. Two years later he left with the 18th Century Corporation Burt Bacharach hits sounded a little baroque.
For the Munich band embryo In addition to conventional guitars, Schwab also played the ancient Indian veena. Schwab finally found the bulbous body of the lute instrument again in the plastic guitars from Ovation. After becoming the first and only European to receive the Ovation Award in 1987, Schwab preferred to play the company’s electro-acoustic guitar.
But unlike, for example, the jazz legend Al di Meola, who – also recognized by Ovation – has a special affinity for their instruments, Schwab used the only Ovation guitar with nylon strings. When the anniversary concert on the occasion of his 80th birthday in 2020 was sacrificed due to the Corona measures at the time, Schwab admitted in an interview that he was always worried that someone could steal the unique piece on which he was allowed to play.
Last Thursday, Sigi Schwab died in Munich at the age of 83 after a long illness.