Cécile Verny Quartet - Amoureuse

timeless jazz from worldmusic to pop

Passionate, honest, real, charming, humorous - that’s how fans and journalists describe the live appearances of the Cécile Verny Quartet. For twenty years now, the African-French singer from Freiburg, Germany, and her excellent band have thrilled not only the record-buying public (”Amoureuse” is already their sixth album), but especially their live-audiences with a swinging mix of Jazz, Poetry and African Grooves. “At last, a singer who doesn’t sound like Ella”, applauded the eminent Jazz-expert Michael Naura of “Die Zeit” and his colleagues are showing themselves to be just as fascinated by the individual and original way this tender superwoman sings and swings.

Speaking of which: “Is there anything or anywhere, where love doesn’t swing?” asks Cécile Verny herself and us in relation to her favourite subject. “Whether you don’t want to have one anymore or you’ve had too many or you’re living happily in a relationship. Emotions, love - they will always be there.” That’s why she has named her new album “Amoreuse”. You begin to fall in love with this follow-up to last year’s “The Bitter And The Sweet”, which was awarded the prestigious “Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik” last year, with the first notes of the title-track already, with it’s cool E-Piano-chords, the brushing rhythm and the melancholic beauty of the melody. The ten following tracks come just as naturally and elegantly, musically as well as thematically full circle. From the poetic swing of the reminiscing “You Will Know When You Get There” to the swinging poetry of “The Fly” (with words by William Blake), from Spoken Word-Grooves like “Ta Question” to elegiac ballads like “Amber Tears” or “J’ aime l’idée”, from the African sounds of “Kanakassi” and “K’la”, inspired by appearances in Uganda the year before last, to a kaleidoscope of jazzy nuances.

All of this makes Cécile Verny and her quartet - proudly featuring Bernd Heitzler on bass, Torsten Krill on drums and percussion, and Andreas Erchinger on everything with a keyboard - so exceptional. Live and in concert these Fantastic Four play the favourites of their previous albums, as well as the eleven new originals of “Amoureuse”. And they do so, as authentically as likeable, and as varied as virtuoso. They are, if you want to call it that, a Jazz-band to love - and it is far from being a one-way affair. “I am thankful to be able to be doing my job”, Cécile Verny says. “I like to sing, talk and laugh. We, as a band, are extremely lucky to be able to be doing what we enjoy doing. And if that is the case, you have to express that gratitude and joy you feel to your public, the people who enable you to do so. There are moments in this complicated world, where you have to close your eyes and just be thankful.”
The perfect music to accompany this can be found on “Amoureuse” - and at each and every live-appearance of the Cécile Verny Quartet.