»Karl Berger – Music Mind« / Das Creative Music Studio - Zu Gast: Joachim Litty und Peter Stephan

Film “Karl Berger – Music Mind” by Axel Kröll and Julian Benedikt
& Talk with Joachim Litty and Peter Stephan with live music
Moderation: Mathias Maschat

Film screening and Talk in German

Few of his generation have shaped free improvisation and world music as profoundly as Karl Berger. A trained musicologist, he emerged from the dim, post-war jazz scene in the South of Germany, where stationed U.S. soldiers fueled the music underground—until renowned American jazz musicians began forming their own bands there. But Berger wanted more.

Leaving behind a teaching assistant job with leading German philosopher Theodor W. Adorno, meeting his mentor Don Cherry in Paris. The journey doesn’t stop there. Alongside his wife, Munich-born singer Ingrid Sertso, he follows Cherry and the great Ornette Coleman to Woodstock in the early ’70s. There, they build something legendary: the Creative Music Studio—a groundbreaking hub for free music and improvisation.

Musicians from across the globe gravitate to Woodstock and CMS: Carla Bley, Jack DeJohnette, Dave Holland, Pat Metheny, Anthony Braxton, and percussion masters like Nana Vasconcelos, Trilok Gurtu, and Ayib Dieng. Decades later, their teachings and spirit live on through workshops and performances.

"Karl Berger – Music Mind" traces his journey from Heidelberg to Woodstock, culminating in a milestone 12-piece orchestra performance at one of Europe’s biggest jazz festival, Jazz Days in Stuttgart. A film by Julian Benedikt and Axel Kroell, 55 minutes, stereo

https://creativemusic.org/karl-berger-music-mind/