Graz jazz club Tubes

Musical cornucopia from Karlheinz Miklin & Band

Following Footsteps around Karlheinz Miklin (2nd from left)(Bild: Marija Kanizaj)

It's a perfect start: Following Footsteps, the jazz quartet of drummer Karlheinz Miklin jr., kicked off its three-day concert series at Tubes - from February 29 to March 2 - with an extraordinary world premiere. 

While the drums are already grooving and hissing crisply, trumpeter Gerhard Ornig takes off on velvet notes into the relaxed, flowing "John and Joe". This somewhat frictional interplay between Ornig's soft, but difficult to articulate melos and the edgy, rolling percussive drive determines many of Miklin's numbers.

Receptive warmth often develops into delicately bitter, dark tones, contributed by bassist Hrvoje Kralj and guitarist Emiliano Sampaio. The latter lets gallant tone garlands flow, which, however, regularly lead into spherical-psychedelic fusion streams in which the tempo and density increase considerably. Alternatively, Sampaio reaches for the Brazilian guitar and mixes Latin folklore with funky, stepping trumpet pulses.

Big footsteps
The footsteps mentioned in the band's name are followed in half two: jazz legend Karlheinz Miklin senior, who died in 2019, is present here with a conceptual piece consisting of sounds that do not sound together. Immediately afterwards, there is another history excursion with Wayne Shorter's "Deluge" - a cornucopia of diversity.

Information and tickets for the Tubes events can be found here.