Bob Degen Quartet feat. Valentin Garvie live at 42nd German Jazzfestival Frankfurt 2011

Valentin Garvie | tp
Bob Degen | p
Ralf Cetto | b
Uli Schiffelholz | dr
recorded live at HR-Sendesaal, Frankfurt, October 27, 2011

1. Etosha
2. In Honour of Spring/ Frickin´Heart/ Parting
3. Vivian Elaine
4. Trails of One
5. B meets P/ Upstart
6. Far from Us
7. Cascade
8. Catability

American pianist Bob Degen grew up in a musical family in Scranton, PA that encouraged his path into music at a very early age. He attended the Berklee College of Music (graduating in 1963) and was also tuitioned by legendary Margret Chaloff (who also taught Herbie Hancock, Steve Kuhn and Chick Corea). A fellow student at Berklee persuaded Bob to come to Germany in 1965. He immediately found work with such as Dexter Gordon, Art Farmer, Carmell Jones, Leo Wright – musicians that had already left the US for Europe. However, he longed to play in a trio and missed the excellence of his former mates. So he returned one more time to the US in 1966 to set up a trio with bassist Mark Levinson and drummer Paul Motian. The trio did an East Coast tour but unfortunately they did not record. After two years with Buddy DeFranco and the Glenn Miller Band, Bob returned to Frankfurt, Germany to settle down. He joined trombonist Albert Mangelsdorff´s group, the HR Radio Jazz Ensemble and worked in different combinations, predominantly with tenor sax great Heinz Sauer. Their duet album Ellingtonia Revisited made Jazz Record Of The Year. In 1976 Bob did his first date for ENJA, the much admired trio album Sequoia Song. On the strength of this album, unknown Bob Degen suddenly had a fan club in Japan advertising for him in Swing Journal! More records followed over the years, a quartet with Japan’s Terumasa Hino, a duet with bassist Harvie Swartz, a quartet with South African drummer Makaya Ntsoko, a fine trio album 1997 with bassist Michael Formanek and drummer Bill Stewart, Catability. 

Bob´s original compositions are interpreted in trio and quartet when Argentinian trumpeter Valentin Garvie joins in on five titles. Garvie is well established in contemporary classical music and works with the worldwide renowned Ensemble Modern out of Frankfurt. Jake Remembered was recorded at the recently revived HGBS Studio in the Black Forest on the legendary Bösendorfer grand piano on which Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans, Friedrich Gulda recorded their master pieces. Bob Degen names as his favorites such uncompromising pianists like Hank Jones, Tommy Flanagan, Bill Evans, and he manages to intercorporate that great tradition into his own, no-nonsense concept that calls for openness and space.