Rüdiger Carl

German free jazz / free improvising musician and composer. He was born 26 April 1944 in Goldap, Eastern Prussia (today Gołdap, Poland). Rüdiger Carl first met Sven-Åke Johansson in 1966 or so in (West) Berlin, where he was living that time, and where he had just moved to. They started playing together in various combinations in clubs and at different events in town, and did their first duo-gig in a museum-art-show '68 there. In 1970 he left Berlin for Wuppertal, met the free-music-guys there, and got together with guitarist Hans Reichel (duo Buben). 1979 he joined a trio with Sven, Hans and Ludwig Petrowski, famous sax/clarinet-player from East Germany, and formed the Bergisch Brandenburgisches Quartett. After 3-4 years this forerunning ensemble came to an end, and Sven and Rüdiger were thinking of how to continue after this high-fly time, including various tours (also a two-week US East Coast tour) and concerts. Then they made two very different decisions, after trying out some possibilities: they kept their musical ideas as a duo, and secondly they formed the Swing Dance Band called Night and Day, playing some selected material of the forties as an acoustic band in ballrooms, night bars, and private parties. Rüdiger played tenor that time and later also a bit of clarinet, Alexander von Schlippenbach did piano, Jay Oliver played the bass, and Sven was swinging on brushes and sticks. This went on for twelve years. The Rüdiger & Sven duo started in 1984, and has been on the road in Europe since then. They did various recordings, live-broadcasts etc., but didn't released anything between 1986 (Fünfunddreissigvierzig) and 2000 ([r667982]).