Ljubljana (SI), Cukrarna Bar
What a journey!!!Let me start from the beginning...we all met on the train from Vienna to Ljubljana round 8:30 and we hadn’t seen each other for quite a while, so we had a lot to talk about…from different projects to, unfortunately, the newly announced Lockdown in Austria, that was about to start the day after our concert, which meant that our other concerts were cancelled. So this concert became all the more special to us, as we knew, yesss we still have this one, this day, this night. I was excited to play our favourite songs from Schubert, Schumann and Brahms for the first time in Ljubljana, all arranged by mathias rüegg - but you know that already of course : )!
Stanislav Palúch was with us again and it is always such a pleasure to get to play with him!
We changed trains in Villach, had to switch once more to a bus and arrived to Ljubljana in the afternoon right on time, where the one and only Hugo Sekoranja was already waiting to pick us up! Dear Hugo, it was about time we met in person : ) and it was such a pleasure, from the whole crew – THANK YOU for inviting us to the Jazz Ars All Stars Series - what a joy and what an honour! And thank you for taking care of us the way you did, Hugo - you rock!!! We played at Cukrarna Bar and let me tell you, it is a really cool place located inside an old sugar factory with an history of poets and poetry. Everybody was extremely kind and helpful and we had enough time to get comfortable on stage. Hans got acquainted with his new and somewhat wild bass but I guess one could call Hans the "bass-whisperer" as after a while he tends to them, interacts with them and he always gets them to a point where they follow his ideas wherever he goes. We had a wonderful “Don’t explain” oundcheck - moment to reconnect and arrive musically. After soundcheck Hugo took us out to dinner downtown, where we got to know eachother better and shared “applestrudel”. With a full belly you either have to go to sleep or immediately get ready to play : ). And that we did, we started right on time as it was also broadcasted live on Radio Slovenija. We opened our set, as almost everytime when we play our favourites, with “The Maiden” by Robert Schumann, it features Stano on violine and myself on the flute and from this shared solo it leads into the “original”piano score where I keep playing the melody on the flute. From the very first note I felt welcomed and I enjoyed every second of sharing our European Song Book with everybody who came out that night! While we played I noticed that almost every second song I chose was a love song, but well isn’t that what it is all about : )…mathias played a moving solo in “In a wonderful hour”, he wasn’t quite happy with him after the concert, but maybe when he listens to this solo, he might be…he had some monitor, bass soundclouds around him, that kept confusing him, but he found his way through! Hans as always rocked his solo moments with impaccable timing, colourful lines and exciting ideas, Ingridiiii I loved “In my dreams I’ve been crying” your Tarabuka solo is just incredibly enchanting and Stano, oh dear Stano, it is just marvelous to play with you, your energy, your lines, your imagination and especially your doubletime-craziness in our first encore “Sweet Violets” everytime makes me wanna jump up and down with joy, which I think I did : )!
After closing the set with “Mondnacht” our night began : )…we got to meet so many of you and we got to know Hugo’s close friends, but we not only got to meet them..I think we all fell a bit in love with everybody that night. We were invited to the unbelievable home of Pavel and his stunning wife and their children, where we had snacks, amaaazing wine, beer, I hugged a unicorn, Stano played guitar, Hugo played guitar, Pavel played Ukulele, we watched and listened to Croatian choirs sing, had a view of the castle, talked, laughed and sang til way past midnight…THANK YOU SO MUCH, it has been an extraordinary night and we can only say HVALA!!!
Yep, the next morning I was so tired I don’t quite remember how I made it back to Vienna. I remember sitting next to a young singer, classical voice student in Dresden and we talked, mathias was there, we switched trains, I think I slept most of time and at some point I got off the train and found myself back in Vienna.
Like I said, what a journey with our fav songs, good wine, beer, a unicorn, warm-hearted people and a view of the castle. To quote Heine from a song of our “my poet’s love” : “What more do you want, my love?”
Oh I know what I want, I want to come back at least once more : )
HVALA, yours truly Lia
WATCH OUR VIDEO LIVE FROM CUKRARNA BAR
https://ars.rtvslo.si/2021/11/jazz-ars-all-stars-lia-pale-mathias-ruegg/
https://youtu.be/ZoWmyr_iCOc?t=345
P.S.: thank you Hugo for all the beautiful live pics!!!
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