Tell-Tale-Heart - Dance in the Haze (2021)

Tell-Tale-Heart is a project that was launched by jazz saxophonist Ralf-Peter Fuchs in 2015 to perform his own pieces. Sava Medan, bassist who currently lives in Paris, has been there from the start. For the first CD, two musicians from the Ruhr area, Christian Hammer (guitar) and Michael Knippschild (drums), were part of the party and were empathetic to make musical narratives sound. Ralf-Peter Fuchs, Professor of History at the University of Duisburg-Essen, wrote his songs over a long period of several years, under the impressions he received from dealing with historical topics. Many of the songs were written in Munich, where he was also a professional musician at times. The CD "Dance in the Haze" is about witch dances, Spanish mercenaries in the early modern times, the medieval hustle and bustle in a port on the Ligurian coast, and last but not least, the story of Chunanup, the eloquent oasis man, from ancient Egyptian literature .
The project follows the tradition of storytelling in jazz, for which there are numerous models. The recordings for "Dance in the Haze" were made in August 2019. Due to the corona epidemic, it was not possible to present the music together in concerts. The band hopes that this will change soon and that gigs will be plannable again. Other compositions are also waiting to be played. Tell-Tale-Heart will therefore be continued and further developed as a concept.