female trumpeter, singer, composers, guitarist, jazz, smooth jazz

The Duo: Michaela Rabitsch & Robert Pawlik

Two who replace a full band!

Michaela Rabitsch - singer and Austria's only female top jazz trumpet player and her ingenious partner - guitarist Robert Pawlik are delighting equally press and audience with their crossover repertoire of jazz, pop and latin.

“Just the two of us“ is the title of their current duo-release and it happens to be one of the pop-songs, which harmonically combine the self-written material of the duo with jazz- and latin-standards into a refined performance concept.

Robert Pawlik‘s guitar is equally able to create a cristal-clear frame full of feeling for the expressive voice and the sensitive trumpet playing of Michaela Rabitsch and to be the virtuoso replacement for the groove of a full rhythm section.

Especially their original, atmospheric compositions gives them a unique, charming profile. The entire repertoire features sophisticated melodics seasoned with a touch of blues.

Vienna‘s simpatico first couple of jazz (Hannes Hoettl, Wohin-in-Wien) sets new benchmarks in unplugged duo playing and impresses with touching and catchy songs.

Besides .....the history of the duo

The story of our duo started quite morbidly with a reverent appearance in the crematory of the central cemetery of Vienna around spring/summer of 1998. By request of the bereaved we played two of the deceased favorite songs: W.C. Handy's St. Louis Blues and On the Sunny Side of the Street. This was the first time for us to examine the interpretation of the jazz stiles of the 1920's and early 1930's in a profound way.

Until that time we were geared to the stile of musicians like Miles Davis, Wes Montgomery, Chet Baker, Dizzy Gillespie, George Benson, Freddie Hubbard, Pat Metheny, Frank Zappa or bands like Joe Zawinul's Weather Report or Herbie Hancock's Head Hunters. Nobody - least of all ourselves - would have thought that we would play a Louis Armstrong tribute with our quartet two years later.

Soon after our first duo-performance the same agency offered us quite regular 20 minute shows. As the repertoire had to change each time, we were forced to deal intensively with the art of playing duos. We developed constantly and the duo came to be an important alternative to our jazz quartet. It was usually booked, when the transparent sound of the duo was asked for, when the available space was too small or when the acoustic circumstances were too difficult for a whole band, or - much more mundane - when there was not enough money for four.

By and by we developed our sound and a special repertoire, and the duo started to contrast with the quartet increasingly. It had developed into an independent formation with a complete, individual concert repertoire including a lot of original compositions, written especially for the duo. A lot of the latest compositions are done together in interaction which helped us to regard the special situation of duo-playing.
One of our main goals is to play grooving and eventful songs also without a rhythm section.

Finally we released our first duo-CD in September 2005.

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