“An incredible musician from another planet”: fellow musicians remember Harry Pepl

The Danish drummer Kresten Osgood has been playing “Halley's Comet Light Blue Blues” for over ten years and considers Pepl one of the most important guitarists in European jazz. Herbert Kefer of the Artis Quartet, a Viennese string quartet, calls the rehearsals for the premiere of “Über Kurz oder Lang” in 1993 “a great object lesson”. The bass clarinettist Michael Riessler learned Pepl’s expression, the “fierce chord”, at what was probably their only concert together, in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1992. Gottfried Zawichowski, co-founder of the Lower Austrian Jazz Academy (NÖ Jazzakademie), remembers the weeks in Zeillern, Lower Austria, Austria. Two who had lessons with Pepl speak of him as a teacher: Helmut Weinhandl, his student in Graz, Austria, in 1991/92, transcribed a blisteringly fast improvisation by ear into a score, and the Swiss guitarist Urs Röllin gained a new approach to the guitar in Wengen, Switzerland.

More in the archive

• Kresten Osgood
• Halley's Comet Light Blue Blues
• Artis Quartet: premiere of “Über Kurz oder Lang” in 1993
• Herbert Kefer
• Michael Riessler
• Gottfried Zawichowski (new page)
• Helmut Weinhandl
• Obsession
• Urs Röllin
• Teaching: Lower Austrian Jazz Academy in Zeillern