Pablo Held Investigates

This episode is in German, for English subtitles please watch the video version. I’m excited to include Christian Lillinger, one of the most individual voices on the drumset in music today, in this series of interviews. Christian is a role model for me on a lot of levels. His no-bullshit/no-compromise attitude is admirable and I think it results in a crystal clear vision of a singular artist. As a leader & sideman he’s been involved with a lot of my favorite groups today: GRUND, Open Form For Society, GRÜNEN, Dell/Lillinger/Westergaard, Amok Amor, Ronny Graupe’s SPOOM and Gropper/Graupe/Lillinger, to name a few. Also, Christian runs an incredible label called PLAIST MUSIC, where he releases genre-free music by himself and other cutting edge artists. I have know Christian for a long time. We came up more or less at the same time and throughout the years I’ve have had the great pleasure of playing with him on different occasions*. I’m happy to share our interview which by the way features a little cameo (totally unplanned, although it looks staged) by a frequent collaborator of Christian’s. Enjoy!

Bill Frisell was on the top my list right from the start of this interview series. Through the help of Mike Gibbs, I finally got in touch with Bill and we had a lovely conversation. What is there to say about Bill Frisell’s music that hasn’t been said yet? I mean, I don’t know anyone who knows about his music and doesn’t like it – everybody loves Bill Frisell! Maybe it’s because he’s so eclectic, so there’s something in there for everybody? Or because of his unique approach to the guitar? Or maybe because he enriches every musical setting? Because of his great tunes? His many different bands? The classic recordings he contributed to as a sideman? I really don’t know… there are so many things to love about him, his playing and his music. OK maybe I should stop rambling… You have a 2 hour conversation ahead of you, and you’re in for a ride. Enjoy! For further listening, here are some of my favorite recordings with Bill: • In Line, Bill Frisell with Dave Holland & Elvin Jones, Sign Of Life, Gone Just like a Train, Where in the World?, Hemisphere’s (with Jim Hall), Quartet, Bill Frisell/Ron Carter/Paul Motian/, Have a Little Faith, Small Town & Epistrophy (with Thomas Morgan), Songs we know (with Fred Hersch) ALL albums by Paul Motian w/ BillALL albums by Jakob Bro w/ BillKenny Wheeler – Angel SongAmarcord Nino RotaMarc Johnson – Bass Desires / The Sound Of Summer RunningLyle Mays – Lyle Mays / Street DreamsPaul Bley – FragmentsJohn Scofield – Grace under Pressure / This meets ThatMike Gibbs – A Bill Frisell Set ListJoey Baron – Down HomeTony Scherr – Come AroundRon Miles – I Am A Man / QuiverScott Colley – EmpireAndrew Cyrille – The Declaration of Musical Independence

I was 7 years old when I first heard Wallace Roney’s playing on Herbie Hancock’s “Dis Is Da Drum”, a record that has over the years remained very important to me. I was always drawing to people that respect (and draw their inspiration from) the masters that came before them. Wallace was somebody who went all the way. Where some only deal with the surface, the cliché, the easy way out, Wallace went deep and found his own stuff. And this is why he was taken on by the masters. I mean – Miles’ ONLY student? Come on! When Herbie, Wayne, Ron & Tony could have chosen every trumpet player on earth, they chose him. And he was somebody who didn’t keep his gained knowledge from those masters to himself. He shared it with others. That’s a big lesson, right? To me, inspiration is like a trampoline. If you only jump into it with little energy and conviction, the jump will not be significant and likely not memorable. But if you go ALL THE WAY, jump into it with all you have, it will catapult you into heights where you’ll be able to see differently, see things more clearly. Plus, it will bring you away from the inital source of inspiration…. and then back again with a new perspective!! I think that’s what Wallace did over and over again with all the music he loved. Listening to him I can hear so much love for his idols, but he didn’t stop there. He took those lessons and applied them to his music. When I released my first interview of this series, my conversation with Wayne Shorter, Wallace Roney was one of the first people to send me a nice message via Facebook Messenger congratulating me on interviewing Wayne. I was really taken by that gesture, kept in touch with him after that and finally in 2019 I asked him if he’d like to do an interview with me as well. I’m so happy that we got to do this and I learned so much during this conversation. Yet, at the same time I’m really sad that we didn’t get to finish it. You’ll hear a pretty aprupt ending of our conversation which was due to a bad interview connection (hence this interview is audio-only) . We decided to finish it some other time and sadly we didn’t get around to it after all. However, I think there’s enough that we all can learn from the things Wallace has shared during this conversation. He will be missed by many. Thank you for all the inspiration and wisdom, Maestro Wallace! Supported by NICA artist development, a program funded by

This episode is in German. The video version has English subtitles. My story with Achim Kaufmann started when I discovered Paul Heller’s great albums “Kaleidoscope” & “Little Songs” as a teenager. I listened to them a lot, and Achim played piano on both. I really liked his playing, so I started to check out his own stuff. I started with his first album “Weave” — and it changed me forever! To this day it is one of my top 5 piano trio albums and I still listen to it quite regularly. The compositions, Achim’s chemistry with bassist Ingmar Heller & drummer Jochen Rückert, their playing, the sound — this record has inspired generations of musicians since it came out in 1998. To understand his journey better, I worked my way through Achim’s records in the order they were recorded. Next up were the amazing quartet records “Double Exposure” & “Gueuledeloup” . I got obsessed with them and totally loved the music but had some difficulties following it. I couldn’t tell what was improvised and what was written. So I got in touch with Achim to take a lesson. I asked him lots of questions about these records and he graciously explained his process to me, showing me the leadsheets while listening to the music together. He showed me other records that I didn’t know before and we played together a little bit, me on piano and Achim on Wurlitzer. After this lesson I was full of inspiration!! In the follow-up to that we exchanged e-mails and I asked Achim how he dealt with writers-block… I still look at his advice whenever I don’t feel inspired or I’m at a loss for ideas. When I l finally left my hometown Hagen to study in Cologne, I went to see Achim whenever he played in town. Every time I was in awe and I always tried to talk to him after the gigs, to ask him what he was working on or listening to lately. Many years later, after I started this series of interviews, Achim sent me a nice note, telling me that he enjoyed watching them. Naturally asked him if he would be interested in participating. Today I’m happy to share our conversation with you. Hope you enjoy! …. … OK, now I feel bad for not mentioning some other records that have been very influental to me so here’s another list: Achim’s Kyrill, Verivyr, Later, Mnemon Peter Bolte – Trio & Keeping Christian Lillinger’s Grund – Second Reason & Grund & COR Christian Weidner – Dream Boogie & Every Hour of Light and Dark Common Ground Robert Landfermann – Topaz all the records with Grünen “Furthermore” “Nothing Something” & “Something Nothing” with Michael Moore

Marc Johnson — one of my favorite bassists of all time. I was always drawn to his warm sound and fluid way of playing, always taking risks, always propelling the music forward. The first time I saw him live was in 2004 during a concert of the John Abercrombie Quartet at the Domicil in Dortmund — a night I’ll never forget! I often go back to my memories of this particular concert. It was a great pleasure for me to finally talk to him and I’m excited to share our conversation with you.

Norma Winstone is one of the most influential singers of our time. She certainly influenced me and my music in a big way. Her record “Somewhere Called Home” is one of my most favorite albums of all time. Furthermore Azimuth, all of her work with my late teacher John Taylor, Kenny Wheeler and so much more has been a deep source of inspiration for me throughout the years and I go back to those records regularly. Even before I started this interview series I had a strong desire to talk to her about her music. My friend Kit Downes kindly put us together and we went from there. Just days after this conversation Norma came to my trio gig at King’s Place in London and checked out our music. I was really touched by that gesture and I think it speaks volumes about what kind of person Norma is. I’m thrilled I got to talk to her. Hope you enjoy!

Pedro Martins’ album “Vox” was one of my absolute favorite releases from 2019. I listened to it countless times and I’m still mesmerized by its unique beauty, deep compositions and great playing by everyone involved. Pedro has a real gift for writing timeless melodies!! The first time I noticed him was a couple of years ago when I watched this video of him playing Milton Nascimento’s song “Travessia” which really touched me. I kept his name in mind and eagerly awaited his first release. After this conversation I was so inspired that I immediately wrote a song for him. His pure love for music is contageous. I hope you enjoy our talk as much as I did.

I’m happy to present a special episode of this podcast: This is an audio commentary to my new album “Ascent” which was just released on Edition Records. I often enjoy checking out the audio commentaries that directors include in the bonus features of their movies. Listening to them talk about their methods and inspirations while you’re watching the movie has always fascinated me and I kept thinking about how great it would be to have something similar in the music field. I know a few examples of that, but I’d love to have one of those for all my favorite albums — imagine having and Audio Commentary to “Bitches Brew”, “A Love Supreme” or “Word of Mouth” … how great would that be? Anyways… here’s my attempt at that. Before I went into the studio to record this I checked out the audio commentaries to “The Machinist”and “Goodfellas” which was a nice way to prepare. I had a great time doing this and I’m already thinking about doing these for each one of my albums. Hope you enjoy this and get some useful background info on how this music came to life. Listen to the audio commentary on your favorite podcast platform, on YouTube or right here: This episode was supported by NICA artist development, a program funded by

What is left to say about the incomparable Larry Goldings that hasn’t been said yet? Frankly, after having shared a couple of these interviews + having written personal introductions to each one of these, I hope it doesn’t sound too repetitive… Why? Because all the stories of what happens when I’m inspired by someone share the same plot: I listen to someone for the first time, get inspired, I try to check out as much concerts/records/interviews/videos/etc as I can… I’ll transcribe songs, look for bootlegs, read the biography, I’ll try to check out the stuff that this person was influenced by… I’ll do everything that helps me understand this person’s process and I’ll do this with everyone that interests me. This is why all the stories may sound a bit alike. I hope that’s OK. So back to Larry. When I was a kid I was listening to Larry’s playing on John Scofield‘s masterpiece record “Hand Jive”. Later when I was getting into playing the piano myself I used to play a long with it a lot. The line up, the repertoire and the amazing playing by Larry on organ and piano just put a spell on me. While my parents became fans of Larry’s music I followed them along, listening a lot to Larry’s own “Intimacy Of the Blues”, Scofield’s “Groove Elation”, Michael Brecker’s “Time Is Of The Essence” and other records. After a while I had most of Larry’s records, either through my parents or through my own purchases. My favorite Larry Goldings Trio record was always “Sweet Sience” and though I love everything that Larry has done, I have a special soft spot for this particular record. There was a time where I would only listen to my three favorite songs from that record : “Asimov”, “This Guy’s In Love With You” and “Spring Is Here” on repeat … to this day I still go back to that record a lot and I keep noticing news things in the music – it keeps on giving! When I was 17 years old I had a lesson with great pianist and composer Florian Ross and he played me “Sticky Mack” from Larry’s piano trio record “Awareness”, a record that I didn’t know until that point. I was blown away! I’d say that “Awareness” is one of my top five favorite piano trio records of all time! I got to talk to Larry a couple of times after concerts of him that I attended and he was always very kind and generous in sharing his memories when I asked him about stuff. This is our first lengthy conversation and I enjoyed it a lot. Thanks for talking to me, Larry!

The first time I heard Peter Bernstein was on “The Intimacy Of The Blues”, the first Larry Goldings Trio album that my parents used to listen to and I really liked that album. When I got more into to buying my own records I bought “Heart’s Content”  – I really lived with that album for a while, listening to but often times, also playing along with it quite a lot. I became in awe of Peter’s sound and his extraordinary talent for melody.  Another important record during this time was “Sweet Sience” by the Larry Goldings Trio. Among my favorite albums of Peter are “Monk”, “Solo Guitar, Live at Smalls”, “Heart’s Content” and “Earth Tones” and of course all the other albums with the Goldings Bernstein Stewart trio. Since I started this interview series I got to talk to his Peter’s longtime musical partners Larry Goldings and Bill Stewart and I’m happy to finally include Peter himself in this series of interviews now. We talk about melodic lines, his teacher Ted Dunbar, playing with Sonny Rollins, guitar keys & open strings, Monk’s music, the lesson with Keith Jarrett, the Goldings Bernstein Stewart trio and much more. Hope you enjoy!