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Lachner describes the record's paradox: Pepl, once recognisable by a modified Ovation guitar, later worked with samples on the MIDI guitar; here, however, he plays a real Bösendorfer grand piano from the guitar, and only “The Last Bars Of Mankind” sounds different. He calls this “a most radical use of technology” and quotes Dave Liebman on the urge to go beyond the limits of the instrument. The piano track is completely improvised, inspired by recordings of Arnold Schoenberg's piano works; the lyricism of “Alone Is A Golden Stone” and the trance-like 4/4 groove of “Magnet Resonance” stand amid highly abstract, atonal pieces. It closes with Glenn Gould as another source of inspiration. Plus the credits: recorded in November 1989 at the Sing Sang studio, Vienna, recording engineer Richard Österreicher jun., digital editing “Ton Eichinger”, produced by Harry Pepl, executive producer Wulf Müller, published by Antenna Music; thanks to Peter Lemell and the technicians of Bösendorfer and to AKG; front cover concept Marie-Luise Rausch, photography and design Wolfgang Plenk, booklet photos Fischnaller. The scan lacks one page of text between “(hence” and “deconstruction of old and worn-out musical patterns”.

a most radical use of technology: to play on a midi guitar connected to a computer just to return to a natural, acoustic sound

The simulation is complete, the circle is fullfilled and we should not be puzzled by the technical method but by the musical result.

Austrian guitarist Harry Pepl has gone a long and imperturbable way.

And yet, it is not a sampled sound, it's a Bösendorfer grand piano - played on the guitar.

the lyricism of "Alone Is A Golden Stone", the trance like 4/4 groove of "Magnet Resonance" are organically embedded into a context of highly abstract, atonal pieces.

If you're a great instrumentalist, you want to be able to express anything of the instrument, even beyond the instrument. It's not an instrument any more but an expression.

Dave Liebman

Harry Pepl is a man like Albert Einstein, a genius whom probably only a handful of people can still follow in his work.

Richie Österreicher jr.

The latest LP by the guitarist, acclaimed worldwide, is: a piano record.

free process of composition, in which the work is already fixed in writing at the very moment in which it is invented

It presents Pepl as a professor in Graz and a composer in demand: a piece for the internationally renowned Kronos Quartet is about to be premiered in Graz in the autumn of 1991, another for the Artis Quartet is planned. For two years he has been composing with his “instant” or “real-time composing”. Pepl admires Mozart, Schoenberg's piano works and Giacinto Scelsi, and has analysed the rhythmic precision of a Bach recording by Glenn Gould on his computer. The text also mentions his two years at Gerhard Bronner's “Fledermaus” bar, the ORF Big Band (ORF: Austria's public broadcaster), several wins in the Jazz Live readers' poll and Le Monde calling him a “giant of improvisation”.

It is hard to place Harry Pepl anywhere musically, and strictly speaking it is not even necessary.

Pepl, and he leaves no doubt about this in this conversation either, is a musician of the moment.

the leading French newspaper Le Monde crowned him, without further ado, a “giant of improvisation”

Shortly afterwards the album “N.Y.C. Impressure” was made in New York.

We think this will be an invaluable opportunity to expose your music to a New York audience.

In the issue, Hannes Schweiger describes the history and programme of the New York club Knitting Factory (New York music club for jazz and the avant-garde) and reports that in summer 1992 Pepl played there for an evening with his quartet (Klaus Stötter, Paul Nowinski, JoJo Mayer). Pepl describes how the pace of New York changed the way he plays.

I noticed myself that I play completely differently there than at home.

On his performance at the Knitting Factory, New York’s avant-garde club, in summer 1992

Harry Pepl

The ambience of the club is rather plain. Playing there was really an experience.

On the Knitting Factory, New York’s avant-garde club, where he played in summer 1992

Harry Pepl

The discussion of the work lists commissions, festivals and awards and describes the quartet, written in February 1993, in three parts. The ORF (Austria's public broadcaster) broadcast the concert on Ö1 (the ORF's cultural radio channel) on 12 May.

from Pepl one may only expect the unexpected

The Lower Austrian Harry Pepl loves the battle with “Bits and Bytes”.

His latest hobby-horse goes by the name of “real-time-composing”.

It also contains Colette Oswald’s band photo on the Bow Bridge in Central Park, New York, a cover painting by Margit Taus, design by Andreas Ortag, a long list of thanks (state of Upper Austria, Ministries of Education and Foreign Affairs, American Music Project, musicians such as George Lewis and Harry Sokal), a remembrance of George Adams and Carter Jefferson and the note “Harry Pepl plays PRS guitars and Tomastik strings”. No recording date is given.

The recording is on compact cassette (shelf mark 6-69955) and can only be heard on site at the Mediathek in Vienna; the catalogue does not give the broadcast date. The quartet played at the Graz Meeting on Wednesday, 20 April 1994, at the Orpheum in Graz, Austria.

Thanks to cleverly pre-planned pieces and compelling solos, the author counts the record among the most exciting things produced in Austria in recent years.

The Viennese Harry Pepl, who counts among the most distinctive guitarists on the continent

recorded an album which, thanks to its so cleverly conceived tracks, ploughed through with compelling solos, ranks among the most exciting things produced in this country in recent years.

Tošić hears a groovy affair with a rock-style distorted tone and highly individual phrasing; sound quality very good.

On N.Y.C. Impressure his guitar sound is once again recognisable as such.

Of course his phrasing is once again highly individual, which means: appealing and pleasantly unpredictable.

And so it may well happen that the guitar professor shines with a rock-distorted sound.

Jazz Festival Raab, 20 to 23 May 1994 (Whitsun). At the festival in Austria, the performers included […] Harry Pepl in a duo with Jack de Johnette

Short news item from the Slovak Jazz Society on the jazz page of the Slovak music magazine “Hudobný život” of June 1994 about the jazz festival in Raab, Upper Austria, Austria (today INNtöne), at Whitsun 1994; “Jack de Johnette” as printed

It contains a short biography, collaborations, festivals and a discography, the method of Real-time Composing and a list of works with premieres for Ensemble Wien, Ensemble Kontrapunkte, Kronos Quartet, STUDIO PERCUSSION and Artis-Quartett.

has come to the fore since 1984 as a composer of European contemporary art music

Ferguson calls Pepl “a musician who hears”, who immediately translates what he hears into music from his own fingers and his own voice; on the guitar he is “one of Europe’s undisputed jazz masters”, on the piano a virtual stranger, which is exactly what gives the music its magic. He hears “a dream played awake”, a pure music played without technique, only with musicality and flow, a response to the big black Steinway in the acoustics of the Musikverein, and in it the pianistic heroes Gould, Jarrett, Debussy, Cecil Taylor, Bach, Schoenberg and Schubert. Pepl has the jazz man’s joy of real-time composition; the titles are chosen for personal reasons (childhood, “High Noon”, Gould). It closes with the master of the strings as “a masterly novice full of music”. The booklet also names Ferguson as editor (with Daniel Pepl) and as translator of Georg Pepl’s text. The text is available as a text PDF for signed-in users.

his very own instrument–the guitar–where he is one of Europe’s undisputed jazz masters

Harry Pepl is a musician who hears. He has that seldom gift–to immediately translate what he hears into music coming from his own fingers, into music coming from his own voice.

It is a dream played awake, full of snatches of music, gestures, spaces.

he is simply unafraid of any musical task, and has the jazz man’s joy of real time composition.

Let us simply enjoy the novelty and richness of this master of the strings becoming a novice at the keyboard, a masterly novice full of music, in a fast stream of rhythms and thematic lines, flowing.

The text presents the improviser at the piano as an image of isolation and of freedom and draws a line from Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s free fantasias via Mozart and Beethoven to jazz, which built dams against the “flood of improvisation”. He reads the flowing that gives the album its name through Rousseau’s “Reveries of the Solitary Walker”, Goethe’s “Werther”, Freud’s “oceanic feeling” and Herbert Marcuse. At the piano Pepl enjoys losing himself in the moment, the notes stream out “all by themselves, as silent water or as a flow”; in “Grace & Gary” and “2 Klavierpianos” he improvised a second piano track over the first. On the titles: “Man könnte Klavierspielen müssen” as a reminiscence of Glenn Gould, “Improv 2” of Schubert’s impromptus, “Grace & Gary” of the film “High Noon”; on “3 Mo” he quotes Pepl himself (“mothy, momenty, minory”). The German text is freely available as a text PDF, Ferguson’s English version for signed-in users.

While playing the piano Harry Pepl enjoys being able to elevate himself to the mood of the moment, or to plunge into a different sense of being. The notes are independent, streaming out all by themselves, as silent water or as a flow.

Just looking at the titles of his pieces one recognises that Pepl is a deeply musical and romantic artist. Musically his playing is related to language itself, he has listened to its rhythms and double meanings.

The improvising pianist flows out into the world of tones, the piano player melts into oneness with the piano, desists in his identity as a subjective entity.

3 Mo stands for mothy, momenty, minory. Mothy because the music sounds as if the moths are waiting to pounce.

Word play on his piano piece “3 Mo” from the album “Flow” (1996): three German adjectives beginning with “mo”, echoing Motten (moths), Moll (minor key) and Moment

Harry Pepl

Exploring the limits was obviously always his endeavour.

Pepl talks about his beginnings, the Jazzzwio, the brief engagement with Benny Goodman, Real-time Composing and MIDI technology, and announces reissues of “Gegenwind” and “Montreux 81”.

I wanted you to be able to hear the room on the CD as well.

Harry Pepl

My main problem is my high blood pressure. Another contradiction: on the outside I may seem calm, but inside it races around in me like mad.

Talking to Martin Schuster of the Austrian music magazine Concerto in 1998, at the Café Museum in Vienna, around the time of his piano album “Flow”. Pepl speaks openly and with self-irony about the blood pressure that kept him off the stage from 1994/95, and about the contrast between outward calm and inner high voltage

Harry Pepl

I am a man of contrasts, often very funny or ironic and then very sad again. You can probably hear that in my playing too

Talking to Martin Schuster (Concerto, an Austrian music magazine) at the Café Museum in Vienna in 1998; the interviewer describes how Pepl speaks in a deep, gentle voice, giggles at a bon mot and turns serious again the next moment

Harry Pepl

For me music means emotions and memories. And even when I play something I don’t much like, my blood pressure goes up, because then it gets on my nerves.

In Concerto in 1998, about the guitar, which he did not touch for a long time after 1994 because he feared the excitement; „auf den Wecker gehen“ (literally “to get on one’s alarm clock”) is colloquial German for “to get on one’s nerves”, and the remark is self-ironic. At the piano he then found a new freedom

Harry Pepl

Music: Harry Pepl (prize of honour), Friedrich Keil and Elisabeth Schimana (recognition prizes)