I feel more than honored

I feel more than honored; after 40 years in this music, this is the first time I made it on the cover of a magazine, and with such a lovely photo by Petra Cvelbar.
Many thanks to Franpi Sunship Barriaux for making this possible.
On top of that there are reviews of my three recent releases in the magazine: Griener Roder : Be Our Guest, Lina Allemano’s Ohrenschmaus: Flip Side and The Straight Horn of Rudi Mahall.

https://www.citizenjazz.com/Michael-Griener-Berlin-est-une-rythmique.html

Here’s the full article, translated into English:

MICHAEL GRIENER, BERLIN IS RHYTHMIC

Meet Michael Griener, one of Europe’s most impressive drummers.

When you’re an observer or an enthusiast of music, especially jazz, you’re always drawn to names that keep popping up. The name of Michael Griener, the drummer who is never far away from the double bass player Jan Roder, is one of them: from Ulrich Gumpert to Alexander von Schlippenbach, via Silke Eberhard, a map of German and European tenderness emerges. The strength of the friendship that has united Griener and Roder for thirty years is illustrated by the fabulous Be My Guest, recently released and packed with previously unreleased material. More a panorama of our music than a compilation, this record is a jewel of humility and joy of playing, which also shines through in this first interview with a musician who embodies an enchanting, vibrant Berlin.

– Michael, you and Jan Roder have formed a solid rhythmic foundation for 30 years. How did you meet?

Jan Roder and I met in the early 90s in Hannover, Germany, where Jan was (briefly) studying double bass as part of the jazz curriculum. I had been a visiting student at the same university a few years earlier, when I was still at school, but I’d never been able to bring myself to really study at a school; I had too many other things on my mind. Jan, who came from a rock background, had turned to jazz because he’d heard Cecil Taylor and was so impressed. Unfortunately, his first jazz bass teacher convinced him that he had to learn the standards before he could play freely, so he took this detour.

By this time I’d been playing professionally for a few years after leaving school and had experience of both straight-ahead and free styles, having started playing both at the same time early on with Rudi Mahall and others.

After that we played in a number of bands together, some with more conventional jazz, but also more and more of our own music. The trio with saxophonist Christof Knoche, which is the first to appear on our CD, marked the beginning of our rhythm section concept.

– How do you explain – if there is an explanation! – the chemistry between you? Who are your role models?

As instrumentalists we obviously have role models, but as a rhythm section we have no one to imitate. The good thing is that we’ve played together a lot, even in very different contexts, and we’ve developed our style naturally. Of course the Mingus/Richmond team is a reference for us, but there’s no leader here: decisions are much more intuitive. We’ve known each other for a long time and even shared a flat in Berlin for a few years. We’re very different, both in and out of music, and we give each other a lot of freedom to be ourselves. Above all, we know how to make the most of each other’s strengths and weaknesses in the service of music.

– There’s a feeling in Berlin that the Griener/Roder rhythmic double act has become a must-have, the place to be for any musician who wants to take on the German capital… Does your anniversary album reflect this?

I don’t think we are perceived as a special unit. At least we have the impression that nobody outside the musicians we play with pays much attention to what we do. We just did our first interview together after all these years and we haven’t won any awards yet. But who knows what the future will bring? The goal of this CD was to put all our work together and show what we’ve been doing for the last thirty years. We never really thought about it, we just played. But while we were in prison, we were talking instead of playing, and we realized that it had been almost thirty years since we started playing together. We thought that would be a good reason to celebrate.

– Be Our Guest gives the impression of one big European jazz family (or one giant Citizen Jazz poster). Is it one of your proudest achievements? Does the album tell a story?

Jan and I have lived in Berlin most of our lives. We moved here in the 90s, mainly to play, with no career plans or financial gain in mind. The city was so cheap back then that money wasn’t an issue. You could put all your energy into the music. The scene was also much more open because nobody could take anything from anybody; there was nothing to take. We made music with everybody who wanted to and everybody who was there wanted to. Otherwise you probably wouldn’t have had much fun living with a coal stove, no bathroom and a toilet outside your apartment, which was our standard of living when we moved to East Berlin. 

Over the years, this naturally led to almost family ties. Our “family” has many famous and not so famous members who all have in common that they are wonderful musicians. There are connections we didn’t even know existed. I think we’re a little proud to have brought musicians together and to have been a part of it for so long.

– The trio has always had a special place in your music: we remember your orchestra with Ellery Eskelin or the Lacy Pool with Uwe Oberg… Is this the approach that suits you best? Would you consider going solo? Or even a duo disc with Jan Roder?

Yes, I think the trio format is my favorite way of making music. The exchange is very direct, but always a bit more thoughtful than in a duo, although I like that too.

I’ve played a few duo concerts with Jan, but having another musician as a guest puts our empathy to the test and we work even better together. We know each other so well that it is almost too easy to play without the distraction of guests. A solo recording is definitely on my agenda, but I have a lot of respect for that: for me, music is first and foremost about communication, and as a musician I live in situations where things don’t go the way I think they should, and I make the best of it. That’s what I enjoy the most. Playing alone is taking that input away and leaving it to me. There’s nothing to hide. I’m going to try playing solo this year and I hope I like the result.

– One of the musicians you play with a lot is Rudi Mahall, with another trio, Ouàt, you invited him to record a roborative The Straight Horn of Rudi Mahall… Another nod to Lacy? Or a desire to play in the most playful sense of the word?

Rudi was literally the very first person I made music with, shortly after I got my first drum kit. At that time, Rudi played only the B-flat straight clarinet; the bass clarinet came much later. We grew together musically and as people and influenced each other.

Of course Steve Lacy is also one of our saints and he’s important to us. But the straight horn joke was also the main idea behind the recording. With Simon Sieger and Joel Grip in Oùat, we have a great respect for tradition, but also a willingness to immerse ourselves in the music. So it was obvious that they were the ideal people for this idea. I got the three of them together in Joel’s studio and did the recordings, but this project was also a kind of debt of gratitude to Rudi. I come from a very simple background. If I hadn’t met him, I probably wouldn’t have become a musician; I didn’t even know it was possible. Rudi, on the other hand, was determined to become a professional musician, even though he could barely play, and it was meeting him that made me realize it was possible. In that respect, I owe him the happiness of my life.

– Among your ensembles on Be Our Guest is the fabulous Die Enttäuschung, an orchestra with a history linked to Alexander von Schlippenbach. Can you tell us something about them? What role does the pianist play in your music, or even in your relationship with Rudi?

After Rudi and I moved to Berlin in 1994, we didn’t play together for a long time. That was when Die Enttäuschung was founded. Monk was always important to Rudi and me, and we tried to play his compositions from the beginning. There were very few scores available at the time, and Brian Priestley’s book of transcriptions was very important to us in the early days. As far as I know, Die Enttäuschung began as a kind of Monk rehearsal project, similar to Steve Lacy and Roswell Rudd’s School Days recording. Soon after, Jan came in to replace the original bassist and they began composing their own material. Alexander von Schlippenbach joined later, but by then the Monk program was almost complete; he didn’t do all the arranging, most of it was done when he arrived. 

The original drummer, Uli Jeneßen, left Die Enttäuschung in 2012, and after trying out several drummers, they ended up with me in 2016. At that time Rudi and I played together for the first time in the band Squakk with trombonist Christof Thewes and Jan, and it was decided to merge the two bands. So Die Enttäuschung became a quintet for a while. In 2017, for Monk’s 100th birthday, Monk’s Casino was also going to play some concerts. Since they knew that I was familiar with all of Monk’s compositions and had no trouble with the arrangements, I became a member of Monk’s Casino as well.

Schlippenbach and Aki Takase live in my neighborhood, and over the years I’ve played a lot with them in various projects, often with Jan at my side.

We played a gig at the Berlin club Au Topsi Pohl in November 2021, as part of a week-long event where Jan and I introduced ourselves and the eight bands that make up the bulk of Griener / Roder’s second CD: Be Our Guest. There is a double LP of the Monk’s Casino concert, and one track appears on both Jan’s and my CD.

– The two characters of Monk and Lacy appear regularly in your recordings. Which jazz musician would you like to honor?

Monk and Lacy are very important to me, as well as Mingus, Ellington and Ornette. For me, it all started with Benny Goodman and Gene Krupa. In fact, all the musicians who have inspired me are important to me. But I think it’s important not to just play someone else’s music, no matter how important it is to you.

As Lester Young said, “You can’t join the crowd until you sing your own song.” You have to have something to say. You have to contribute.

– In your recent trios we’ve heard you with Céline Voccia and Taiko Saito. How do you see the musicians who have moved to Berlin? Has it really become a paradise for improvised music?

There are so many great musicians in Berlin, and there are more and more of them, even if the situation is nowhere near as comfortable as it was in the 90s. I see a lot of young musicians who come to the city and have to earn so much money to live that they hardly have any time to make music. For me, it’s a great situation because I meet new musicians all the time. Either they settle here or they’re just here for a while, but you always find new inspiration and new contacts. If you need inspiration or contacts, there are about ten gigs a night where you can get it.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much infrastructure in the city, no public radio to document the music, and few articles in the press. Things have improved a bit over the years, but for the amount of music here, it’s still not noticed enough. There’s a lot to play, but you have to be careful to get noticed, especially if you’re new to the city. But if you take advantage of the opportunities and don’t spread yourself too thin, it’s still a great place to live.

– What are your upcoming projects?

My trio Oùat with Simon Sieger and Joel Grip is getting very active and we’re touring again this year in Belgrade, Budapest and Berlin. New recordings are planned for next year. There’s also a new trio with Serbian pianist Marina Džukljev and Swiss bassist Christian Weber, and a trio with Rudi Mahall and Swiss guitarist Florian Stoffner. I’ve also decided to finally do some solo recordings, even though I find it difficult. 

I’ve also met so many new musicians that I have no idea what the next year will bring. I’m curious myself.

by Franpi Barriaux // Published September 22, 2024