Duets are a favorite device in the world of jazz and perhaps even more so on the highly improvised side of the idiom. Matthias Müller and Andreas Willers have offered a free improv duet record of an unconventional sort: trombone (Müller) with electric guitar (Willers). The self-titled Matthias Müller Andreas Willers (March 1 2025, MaMü Music) sets no rules for the five, instant pieces contained in this collection.
The two have been collaborating on various projects within the thriving improv and jazz scene of Berlin and that kinship shows up in these recordings (an example of a previous collaboration is shown in the video above). The intuition that shows up as the interact with each other over constantly shifting textures attest to that.
Both Müller and Willers explore the infrequently used percussive properties of their respective instruments for “geel dropen,” where every note hard-won. Notes are more abundant on “as sik dat höört,” but Müller is constantly inventive in how he delivers them, finding novel timbres and sound-bending from the trombone. Willers, too, digs deep in his bag of tricks, but it’s really his dexterity and instantaneously finding the right counterpoints to Müller that stand out the most.
Müller undertakes almost a purely percussive role for “spökenkieker” while Willers covers the tonal areas, moving from wiry to feedback-heavy. “lot uns man nie griepn” sticks to a key and both spin wildly within the orbit of it. For “wrögelich sungn,” Willers applies spooky effects to his microtonal chords.
Taking the trombone and electric guitar to places rarely visited both individually and together, Matthias Müller and Andreas Willers generate a pure form of echtzeitmusik, or ‘real-time music.’
Pre-order/Order Matthias Müller Andreas Willers from Bandcamp.
- Matthias Muller + Andreas Willers – ‘Matthias Muller Andreas Willers’ (2025) - February 25, 2025
- Takuya Kuroda – ‘EVERYDAY’ (2025) - February 24, 2025
- Ivo Perelman & Tyshawn Sorey – ‘Parallel Aesthetics’ (2025) - February 21, 2025
