LIA PALE & MATHIAS RÜEGG –
EUROPEAN SONGBOOK

“European Songbook”: with Mathias Rüegg and Lia Pale, Jazz meets classical music

Following the success of their reinterpretation of Schubert’s Winterreise, singer Lia Pale and pianist and arranger mathias rüegg continue their journey into Romantic Kunstlied with the European Songbook. The new project, presented for the first time at JazzAscona, transforms the melodies of Schubert, Schumann and Brahms into Jazz, exploring the link between European classicism and Jazz improvisation.
Mathias Rüegg, founder of the legendary Vienna Art Orchestra, is considered one of the most important arrangers in European Jazz, also recognized in the United States, where Down Beat magazine honored him three years in a row, from 1984 to 1986, as best arranger. With solid training in classical composition and Jazz piano at the University of Graz, he has developed an original musical language that combines tradition and innovation. Together with Lia Pale, a singer with a refined voice and eclectic approach, Rüegg plays with the boundaries between genres, proving that great music is timeless. How would Schubert have sounded if he had been reinterpreted by Sinatra? How do Brahms’s Lieder sound today in a Jazz context? With European Songbook, Rüegg and Pale answer these questions with an original and surprising sound.