SOL

"Solitude is a kind of freedom" - said the Italian writer Umberto Eco - and it is out of such a positive feeling of loneliness that Pascal Schumacher's album SOL was born, which was released on June 5th on Neue Meister. The sound is characterized by the vibraphone, Schumacher's instrument of the heart, which he fell in love with at first sight when he was a child: "When I had drum lessons in my childhood, there was this golden glittering instrument. I couldn't help but play on it as soon as my teacher left the room," he recalls. This fascination has remained, and Pascal Schumacher incorporated the sound of his vibraphone into various ensembles such as quartets and symphony orchestras before giving him and his musical thoughts space alone, because: "when I was alone I learned so much about myself - more than I could have ever imagined," he says. On the day of the release, he then presented SOL in a special ambience that wonderfully staged being alone with the help of light, interior design and mirrors: Schumacher set up his vibraphone along with other equipment in the Musée d'Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean (MUDAM) in Luxembourg, in the middle of the installation "Untitled (Portland Mirrors)", which was created by Robert Morris in 1977. The concert was streamed live, filmed and recorded under the direction of Yann Tonnar (Garden Stories / 2011 and Alehouse Rock / 2014) and is now released as SOL - MUDAM Session in the series New Master Sessions. The live recording of SOL confirms Schumacher's new-found passion for loneliness with all its attraction, but it also conveys the most important quality of relationships: intimacy. This very moment is amazingly staged with the help of the installation. The piece Melancolia, for example, conveys a unique isolation that is as sad as it is beautiful, and at the same time is broken by the work of the mirrors. Twinkle expresses a deeply personal feeling of enlightenment. "When you play solo, you are really confronted with yourself. With your strong moments as well as your weak ones, which don't necessarily have to be your worst moments. There is something very beautiful about this fragility. It's not unusual for magical things to emerge from it," he says, noting: "Playing solo is already an intense thing. Morris's haunting work of art in the MUDAM has virtually challenged the concepts of perception and space with mirrors and wood - but when it comes to mere listening, the deepened solo play predominates, creating a sensitive and intimate concert moment - in happy solitude.

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Pascal Schumacher

Pascal studied classical percussion, jazz vibraphone and musicology at music conservatories in Luxembourg, Strasbourg, Brussels and The Hague. He holds a Master’s Degree in musicology from the Marc Bloch University in Strasbourg, and another in music with a focus on jazz vibraphone from the Koninklijk Conservatorium in The Hague. He has won many awards, including the Belgian Django d’Or (2005), Music:LX (2012), ECHO Jazz (2012), JTI Trier Jazz (2014), was selected for the Rising Stars program organized by the European Concert Hall Organization (2009 / 10) and appeared as soloist in ECHO Klassik 2017 awarded project Überbach.

He played with many of exciting musicians such Francesco Tristano, Bachar Mar-Khalifé, Jef Neve, Kenny Barron & Magic Malik, wrote music for theater and film and leaded a jazz quartet. Today he mixes emotional classical music with minimal electronic sounds, although Schumacher himself considers each classification obsolete. To him, music is a single, limitless playground.

2018 also marked a new beginning for Pascal Schumacher, who upon invitation to play at Jazz & The City Festival In Salzburg, started to develop his own solo material. The experience opened up an entirely new path for the composer culminating in his debut solo album, SOL. SOL captures Schumacher’s newfound passion for solitude in all its magnetism all the while remaining true to the main characteristic of his relationship with the vibraphone; intimacy. SOL has ben released via Neue Meister in June 2020.

Pascal is a Yamaha Artist and a Professor for Jazz and Classical Percussion at the Conservatoire de Musique de Luxembourg. - He is the Artistic Director of the innovative 'Reset' Music Festival at Abbaye Neimenster and an Ambassador for SOS Children's Villages International - Luxembourg.