Eugen Cicero

Eugen Cicero (* June 27, 1940 in Cluj-Napoca, Transylvania, Romania, † December 5, 1997 in Zurich; actually Eugen Ciceu ) was a classically trained jazz pianist. He became famous with his jazz interpretations and arrangements of baroque, classical and romantic works that made already world known during his lifetime it.

His interpretations of jazz standards he always spiced with quotations from classical works, his fans appreciated him for his unparalleled virtuosity, his brilliant keystroke and outstanding creativity. He played every bit as improvisation, and so no performance with another identical, as evidenced by more than 70 recordings as sound recordings. In 1976 he was awarded the German Record Critics' Award for his editing of compositions by Franz Schubert.

Life

Eugen Cicero began at the age of four years playing the piano, at six he was a Mozart piano concerto with the Symphony Orchestra of Cluj. At the age of 14, he mastered the piano technique already perfect, where he could improvise from the beginning. His parents, his father was an Orthodox priest, and his mother - Hungarian descent - a professional choral singer, supported his musical education. He was eleven years of teaching at Aurelia Cionca, one of the most famous pianists in Romania who had received their training from a master student of Franz Liszt. When Ana Pittis he learned his outstanding stop. Later he studied at the Academy in Bucharest, from which he was expelled for political reasons but in communist Romania. Two years later he was again taken up, and in 1962 he was university professor of music.

In the early 1960s led him on a concert tour with a jazz band to East Berlin, from where he fled to the West of the city. Charly Antolini - a drummer of world fame - gave it to the record company SABA / MPS, where in the next few years made ​​seven joint recordings. From Berlin he moved on to West Germany and in Switzerland, where he met his future wife, Lili. In 1965 he recorded the LP Rococo Jazz, which was sold over one million copies worldwide.

In 1966 he went back to Berlin and spent a substantial part of his subsequent life. He played inter alia, the RIAS Dance Orchestra ( 1965-71 ), and later with the SFB Big Band by Paul Kuhn, with the Munich Philharmonic, arranger and big band leader Peter Herbolzheimer and many other jazz greats. 1970, his son Roger Cicero was born, who also is a well-known jazz musicians today. Ten years later, the marriage ended in divorce with Lili. In 1982, he moved to Switzerland. He was the father of a daughter. Until his death in 1997, he appeared on countless times in Japan, where he had his well enthusiastischstes audience. There he played a also a number of recordings.

Music and personality

In many of his colleagues, he was very popular because of his generosity - he often shared his income with less financially successful musician colleagues.

Even of his private life were he and his music understood rarely correct, the press as well as the promotion of his record company describes his music incorrectly as a mixture of jazz and classical music - Cicero quoted, however, from the classical period, as well as other artists usually cite their colleagues - a important main feature of good soloists, is to show that, if and how well someone knows the Jazz.

Cicero to seamlessly incorporate the classical elements in his game understood. He could at any time change from triplet - American in baroque -classical style, without the bow was lost, let alone entered a stylistic break. A small but striking example of his art of improvisation is his imaginative interpretation of Mozart's variations on the children's song Ah vous dirai je Maman ( Twinkle Twinkle Little Star man).

He often appeared as a soloist, thanks to the classical education at the highest level of virtuosity, his left hand was able to replace an entire band. The game technical difference between right and left hand was completely abolished with him - which probably only Art Tatum and Oscar Peterson installed at this level access roads. However, Cicero preferred playing with other musicians. Legendary is the "Cicero - run", chromatically descending minor thirds, the only one with a series of very quickly - usually the right - hand to be played and the Cicero often began as a unifying element or color pattern between two topics.

Partly been criticized Eugen Cicero because of its proximity to the temporary so-called underground music - comparable to James Last, Paul Kuhn or Erwin Lehn. Cicero was a pioneer and master of the crossover, long before the term found its way into music theory.

Discography

Some of over 70 recordings:

• Rococo Jazz, 1965, with Peter Witte on bass and Charly Antolini on drums
• Cicero 's Chopin ( 1965)
• Balkan Rhapsody (1970 )
• Swinging Classics ( 1973) (double LP, once Liszt, Tchaikovsky once )
• Cicero Plays Schubert, 1975, with the Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn, Jörg Faerber led by ( German Record Award )
• Piano Dreams, released in 2002, with the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra
• Solo Piano, 1978, live concert
• Swinging Piano Classics, December 13, 1996 live concert from Überlingen on Lake Constance, with Decebal Badila on bass, his last recording

In the autumn of 2006 appeared as re-release the following albums:

• Cicero 's Chopin Festival ( 1973)
• Cicero in London ( 1973)
• Eugen Cicero Plays Schubert ( 1975), German Record Prize
• Cicero 's Concerto ( 1976)
• Eugen Cicero - Piano Solo ( 1976)
• Do not Stop My Dreams (1984 ), not yet published in Germany
• Whisper From Eternity (1988 ), not yet published in Germany