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2021

Finally the end of what seemed a very long winter. I am thinking back at the last year and it seems unreal.
And then on the other hand what did change for me? What do I really need? What do I really miss?
Meeting you people, of course. ;-)
Considering the circumstances I was relatively busy, playing a few gigs in between lockdows, teaching at Musikwerkstatt and at Global Music Institute (holding my classes online from Vienna). It was and still is so great to see those familiar faces and stay connected over continents.
And I'd be all happy and talk about crisis as chance bla bla if it weren't for the amount of loss that my friends in India have to experience at that moment.
So I am only left with expressing my condolences and listening to Bill Evans recording of "You must believe in spring" with Eddie Gomez playing one of the most beautiful bass solos in history - imho.

And yes, I do believe in spring.

See you all soon!

2020

So much news, so litte time.. just stay safe eveyone!

2019

March

It's a new year already, time flies.
So far I can see that this summer will be amazing. I am thrilled to take part in a contemporary opera production, composed for classical orchestra and a jazz band and look forward to study a sophisticated bass part. The piece is "Reigen" it is composed by Bernhard Lang. The performances of this cooproduction of Neue Oper Wien and Bregenzer Festspiele will take place in Bregenz and Vienna.

Right after this project the "Children of the Revolution" will the stage this summer and celebrate 50 years of Woodstock!! I am happy and honored to be the musical director of this project and put togehter 3 days of peace and music!

There is more to come and as always I promise more regular updates! At least I try. I really do. Very hard. It's 11pm at a Saturday and I as I am writing this, so you can't say I do make an effort.

I wish you all the best, have fun and enjoy whatever music you like!

2018

This year has been really good and mostly due to my stay in India from January to mid April. I had the honor to teach at Global Music Institute (GMI) in Greater Noida which is around 45 minutes from New Delhi.

As their bass faculty I was teaching bass (of course), ensemble, harmony and eartraing. In addition to that I had the possibilty to create and offer elective courses. Being from Austria it meant a lot to me to present a survey of Western classical music to my Indian students. We even watch a whole opera, "The magic flute" by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. By the way the New York Metropolitan Opera offers in on demand chanel an excellent english version of this masterpiece!
I had a blast teaching young and apsiring musicians and look forward to see them grow.
Thanks again, Aditya, Tarun, Megha, Vinay, Deanne, the whole GMI staff, all my students and of course my colleagues and room mates Luiza and Pedro!!

2017

March

So I finally updated my website again, sorry for the delay! Luckily I have been very busy in 2016 and look forward to a lot of excellent music to play this year!

I am trying to put in a few sentences what happened last year. Spring gave me the opportunity to spend some time again in Valencia, Spain, playing again at Jimmy Glass leading a trio with Toni Belenguer (trb) and Alberto Palau on piano.
While in Valencia I also had the chance to record for serbian-canadian singer Kristina Bijelic and columbian composer Felipe Téllez, who were producing an album of very emotional orchestral music. They asked me to record a bass overdup on top of the reknown Budapest Art Orchestra to add some punch to the bass section of their beautiful Bolero "Enamorarme de tí". Watch the track on youtube and tell me if it worked out ;-)
Another absolute highlight was a recording session with Maria Isabel Saavedra, a reknown columbian singer/songwriter. It was an honor meeting her and recording some tracks for her new album including the title track "Maldito y Santo". I am very happy that there exists a video of this track!

Apart from that I was very happy to play with "Mundharmonika Quartett Austria", Sebastian Laverde Latin Jazz Quintett, Cabrioletta & die Johnnys, Rabouge and many more. It very difficult to pick out one or to highlights, an honor was to play once more in fall with Sebastian Laverde, an incredibly talented vibraphone player and composer, and his quartett including los grandes Raimundo Nieves on piano and Geovrvis "Pico" Milan on drums. We met and played in Lausanne, in the Chorus Jazz Club, a really nice venue and I even had some time to walk around the city. Touring at it's best :-)

This year I look forward to some album releases that I have been involved with!

Mundharmonika Quartett Austria celebrates their 25 year anniversary with a new album.
Click here for an album teaser of "I feel good", you will be surprised what our 4 harmonicas are able to sound like!

A very special and one of the most relaxed productions was the recording of the new "Cabrioletta" CD.
Popular german songs from the 30's and Georg Kreisler as well as some original compositions, Viennese chansons, if you like are the repertoire of this group. In a chamber music setting we recorded all at once including voice and violin, without click, in - a hotel room! Hotel Altstadt Vienna is a boutique hotel for lovers of art and it seems that its vibe and amazing staff set the right tone so that we recorded in such a focused yet relaxed way. A pleasure!
A huge thank you to my colleagues Ursula Baumgartl aka Cabrioletta, Alois Bauerstatter (piano), Martin Spitzer (guitar), Werner Neugebauer (violin) and Klaus Schmid (engineer) and Otto E. Wiesenthal from Altstadt Vienna!

And last but not least a special opportunity was to record with Lîla, a group that combines jazz with indian percussion. "AllOne" will be released in May and I look very much forward to play again together.

There are links to all albums in the discography and I also updated the dates in the live section. So I hope we are in touch again soon!
There is so much music, so much to listen to, to learn and enjoy!

 

2016

February 16 - I can't give everything away...

I have been working on some projects this year that might or might not work out and might or might not lead to something bigger, we'll see. In case they do, be sure I'll let you know :-)

Right now I am very excited about the gigs coming up: (see live - section for details)

"Sounds of Dea" will open her first festival, and I'll be playing in some of the finest venues of the country in the next months.
Recordings and albums are in the making, there is a lot that will happen this year.

Also, I am very happy and grateful that I'll be able to visit Spain in April and play again at Jimmy Glass in Valencia!

Earlier this year I was deeply saddened by David Bowie's death. Ever since I have watched live shows, documentaries and have listened to almost his entire work.

I remember years ago when I sat down with my guitar trying to play along to "Rock'n'Roll suicide" and "Ziggy Stardust" etc.
In the the early 2000s, I saw him live. I think it was the "Heathen"-Tour, one of my favourite albums by the way. I was blown away by his performance and how much he seemed to enjoy singing and playing for us. He came out on stage with a huuuge smile that lasted the entire show.

Needless to say that David Bowie was a genius. A lot of people have put that into words much more eloquently than I ever could.

But he made an impression on me that even went beyond his music. Just now, after hours of hours listening to his music and reading about him, I realized the most fascinating thing about him for me was his fearlessness of change and reinvention.
And this opens up a whole new horizon of inspiration...

2015

November 13

Do you remember Forest Gump? "Life is like a box of chocolate, you'll never know what you're going to get!" In my case it brought me a new instrument half a year ago... the "bass mouth harmonica"! And yes, I didn't know either that it exists. But I am very happy to be a member of "Mundharmonika Quartett Austria" now and we're having a lot of fun on our fall tour! And some videos are coming soon...

Two more exciting things coming up are broadcasts of radio programs I was involved in. Both of them are an exquisite mixture of music and poetry and I am curious of the outcome myself:

Sunday, 15th of November / 11pm / Oe1
"Bucharest is beautiful nowadays, isn't it?" by Bruno Pisek and Denisa Duran. Poetic and musical observations and experiences in a quickly evolving city. I am happy to have been invited to record the double bass parts and furthermore to have been able to contribute a composition for double bass of mine, "Lenoc" !

Saturday, 21st of November / 10pm /Oe1
"Nachtbilder: Poesie und Musik": the broadcast of a live performance of Austrias only "Spoken Choir" at Radiokulturhaus in September this year.
I didn't speak a word cause luckily the concert included musical intermezzi played by an excellent ensemble that I had the honor to be a part of.

 

July 6

Well, it's been a while since I updated the website... To be fair, everybody warned me about inlcuding a "news" section. And I did it anyway with nothing but the best intentions. So, where were we.. My tour in Spain in February was amazing, and I am super happy to be back there in about two weeks:

Tuesday, 21st of July: Lupe Azcano and the Jazzy Jammin' Band @  Café Cronopio, Valencia

Friday, 24th of July: Andrea Fraenzel Quartet @  Jimmy Glass Jazz Club, Valenica!
With the amazing: Alberto Palau (piano), Toni Belenguer (trombone) and Mariano Steimberg (drums).

In March I went to Nashville and Boston, learned a lot about music industry, made new friends and visited old ones.

I've been practising a lot, learned a new instrument (more in a coule of weeks) fell in love with Stanley Clarke, Chick Corea and Christian McBride (again!). I'm seriously thinking of spending a couple of holidays just me, my headphones and youtube. And chocolate ice cream.

Last but not least my singer/songwriter - solo project- alter ego "Sounds of Dea" had a lot going on as well. She was on tour with Australian singer "Aphir" in Austria, paid a visit to "Balcony TV" and has gigs coming up. Have a look at the live section of this website or visit www.soundsofdea.com for dates and recent videos.

She is especially honored to perform alongside "Mary Broadcast" and "Agnès Milewski" on singer/songwriter night at Theater am Spittelberg on Tuesday 28th of July!

 

January 1

Happy New Year, happy news:
I'll be back in Spain for a little tour in February!

Friday, 13th:
"Jimmy Glass Jazz Club" in Valencia will be hosting me as a leader of an amazing quartet: Alberto Palau - piano, Toni Belenguer - trombone, Mariano Steimberg - drums.
Playing with them feels like all you have to do is pick up your instrument and go with the flow... "Groovy ECM jazz" will be the motto of the night!!

Saturday, 14th: Sounds of Dea @ Valencia, Café Mercedes.

Sunday, 15th: Sounds of Dea @ Guzzo Club, Barcelona

"Sounds of Dea" is my singer/songwriter - solo project, yes, just bass and voice and some electronics from my laptop. Curious? Listen to some tunes on my website: www.soundsofdea.com.

So long, un beso,
Andrea