Founded in 2011, the orchestra of 14 virtuosos, under the direction of Pierre-Antoine Badaroux, relentlessly pursues a work that aims to highlight the arrangers of music for big band.

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FROM HISTORICAL REPERTOIRE

Since its creation, the band has been mainly focusing on the jazz from the 20’s to the 40’s, through the music of Don Redman, Fletcher Henderson, Duke Ellington, Benny Carter and others, as well as European musicians. The band has developed a repertory of over 200 tracks and released 4 records in 6 years.

In the manner of the orchestras of early music, the historical research carried out from rare scores and recordings, is based on the intimate conviction that the arrangers, oft-overlooked in the history of jazz, are creators who never stop inventing new forms.

In its performances, the band favors the acoustic as well as a warm and festive atmosphere, whether they are playing in a concert hall or on a village party: music is for all.

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TO CONTEMPORARY CREATION

Also very active on the European stage of improvised musics and jazz, the musicians wanted to widen the band’s repertory with a series of commissions to contemporary composers who maintain an intimate relation with jazz.

And so since 2016, the Umlaut Big Band has created new pieces, first written by members of the orchestra (Pierre-Antoine Badaroux, Antonin Gerbal, Pierre Borel), then by invited composers (Alexander Von Schlippenbach, Jean-Luc Guionnet, Axel Dörner, Bertrand Denzler and Joel Grip).

Too rarely tackled by composers in our days, the form of the big band is ideal for rich sound explorations, and starting a dialogue between a long tradition linked to jazz and the forms of contemporary inventions: music beyong genre.

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IN RESIDENCY (2019-2022)

Invited in residency by the company La Vie Brève who just took the direction of the Théâtre de l’Aquarium (La Cartoucherie, Paris), the Umlaut Big Band occupies the theater to rehearse, build new programs and perform new forms.