Brueder Selke – Stimmen in Prague (Official Concert Film)

Concert film directed by Brueder Selke, filmed by Roman Koblov.

Album available worldwide on 22/11/2024.
Order CD/DL/LP on Oscarson.

Music written and performed by Sebastian & Daniel, Brueder Selke.
Recorded by the same two guys at Palác Akropolis in Prague.
Mixed by Edward Sikorski at Studio B in Dresden.
Re-recorded on tape by Antonio Pulli at Leiter Studio, Funkhaus Berlin.
Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio in New York.
Cover illustration by Vika Valter.
Copyright Brueder Selke & Oscarson 2024.
Published by Kick The Flame.

The polyinstrumental composer and curator duo Brueder Selke (CEEYS), with Sebastian Selke on cello and Daniel Selke on keyboard instruments, born in East Berlin before the fall of the Berlin Wall and now at home in the inspirational UNESCO City of Film Potsdam, presents here their album and concert film STIMMEN IN PRAGUE.

The release is based on an almost unabridged live recording of their remarkable debut performance at Palác Akropolis at the legendary music festival “Spectaculare” in the Czech capital at the beginning of 2022. Just as in East Berlin, State-prescribed socialism had fundamentally shaped the everyday lives of Prague citizens until 1989 such that this coming together between the German artists and their Czech audience was able to produce historical, biographical and with it also humorous parallels, and made the concert feel almost like a home crowd.

While elsewhere improvisation as an expression of disorganisation is sometimes ridiculed, in the Czech Republic, just like in East Germany, it is considered a great art. The ability to react to life’s demands with humour and creativity makes the Czech masters of improvisation – and that’s how they proudly see themselves. And it is against exactly this background that the Brueder Selke concert was for all participants on and in front of the stage one of the rare artistic rays of hope in the middle of the corona pandemic.

Musically the concert offered the first opportunity for an expansive setup – directly preceding the more intimate performance at Dresden’s “Jazzclub Tonne” which was likewise recorded on film and has already been released as the corresponding first part of the duology: BELKA & STRELKA. And so the releases move temporally backwards, contrary to the actual event dates, and serve as a (literal) trip into the past.

As CEEYS (CS), Sebastian and Daniel Selke have released six albums – three duologies – that tell of episodes from their childhood in the former GDR. Together with the acoustic HAUSMUSIK as well as the corresponding rework album MUSIKHAUS, they provide a context, organisation, and at the same time also perspective for their work today.

The invitation to the festival in the Czech Republic (CZ) was for the brothers more than just a performance in the eastern hemisphere, but also brought to light the aforementioned curious parallels to their own past growing up in the real existing socialism of the GDR – from the familiar architecture of the brutalist Plattenbaus and the socialist monuments that remain very present there to the cheerful/pensive reactions of the Czech concert audience who were able to bring to the night their own historical experiences.

Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, encounter and exchange with like-minded people and
musicians has become the fundamental drive of the Selke brothers. And so this album and concert film yearns, but with a certain lightness, to once again confront the subject of societal upheaval, especially in this time of contradictions, separations and confrontations, and at last to overcome it.

www.bruederselke.com
www.oscarson-label.de
www.kicktheflame.de