CD: Life Rhythm

"I'm constantly thinking about how I can position myself as a drumming bandleader in such a way that the instrument takes on a supporting role, but does so in a musical way and by no means as a display of virtuosity," says Wolfgang Haffner. This attitude runs as a common thread through his entire career - and also through "Life Rhythm", his tenth album on ACT.
And although Haffner's music deliberately contradicts common ideas of virtuoso drum leaders, this time the instrument is particularly in focus. The starting point for this was Wolfgang Haffner's very first solo concert in 2022 at Schloss Elmau. He remembers: "That was an insane challenge, where I was also faced with the decision: Am I going to play a drum solo for an hour? Of course not! So I added a lot of melodic-sounding percussion instruments, looped passages live, worked with echoes and delays - basically like in the studio, but on stage." All of this led Haffner to once again deal intensively with the subject of the instrument that has accompanied him throughout his life. And so this time all the pieces on "Life Rhythm" have their origins not on the piano, as is usually the case with Haffner, but on the drums.