Immanuel Wilkins Quartet

GERMAN JAZZ PRIZE 2024:

After his debut album “Omega” was named “Jazz Album of the Year” by the New York Times in 2020 and his follow-up album “The 7th Hand” was also critically acclaimed, saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins became a star. Even then, pianist Micah Thomas and drummer Kweku Sumbry were part of his quartet, who will also be performing in Cologne with Rick Rosato on bass. For “The 7th Hand”, Wilkins, who was born in Philadelphia and now lives in Brooklyn, New York, composed a suite in seven movements. Having grown up in the black church in Philadelphia, Wilkins explores Afro-diasporic tradition. Musically, he translates this idea conceptually and compositionally: each movement of the suite is linked to the next by a triplet metre. These are codes with which he also refers to the history of slavery: “For the slave owner, Aunt Hester’s screams were just screams. But for the other slaves, these screams were messages telling them to flee, to sing, to run – codes that the listeners might not understand.”