Fundaments We Share

The foundation of boundlessness "Write down an eight" is what Walter Sobchak, played by John Goodman, relentlessly shouts at Smokey, the old hippie played by Jimmy Dale Gilmore in the classic film "The Big Lebowski". It is just a single sentence, but it triggers a whole series of events over which the film's protagonists no longer have any control. Coincidence or not? In a movie narrative, in which the derelict private detective Philip Marlowe and Jesus in the person of the Dude merge into one and the same person, nothing is coincidental, whether it is intentional or not. The number eight is a magical number, and not just in Christian symbolism. For it stands equally for the concrete One and the unfathomable Eternal. In early Christianity, the octagon symbolized the perfection of God. Important Christian churches such as the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem or the Palatine Chapel of Aachen Cathedral were based on an octagonal shape. The Hohenstaufen Emperor Frederick the Second transferred this relationship to his own state and had the octagonal Castel Del Monte in Sicily built as proof of his divinity, which has also served as inspiration for jazz albums. In Judaism, the eight symbolizes the gateway from this world to the hereafter. In profane terms, it connects the seven days of the secular week with the sphere of the eight, the divine. Can it therefore be a coincidence that the horizontal Arabic 8 is so strikingly similar to the sign for infinity? The eight always returns to itself. Unlike all other numbers from one to nine, it has no open ends, can never be diverted from itself and is therefore an allegory of the absolute perfection of the creative universe. The eight is stable, rests in itself and yet, by following its curves along a path without beginning or end, holds a never-ending pool of possibilities, no matter where and how you use it. This harmony is reflected not least in the octave. For good reason, it is considered the basic interval in many musical cultures. Regardless of their pitch, we perceive melodies as being the same if they are shifted up or down by one or more octaves. According to recent research, this even applies to most mammals. The figure eight as a symbol of the self-representing universe has been in our DNA for millions of years ... we cannot deny it. In jazz, we rarely find the octet. Even in early jazz, a distinction was made between the combo with up to seven players and the big band with considerably more members. The line-up of eight musicians led a rather miserable existence for decades. Yet in a seemingly miraculous way - if we follow the historical, mythological and genetic logic of the eight in a rather compelling way - they unite the advantages of the limited small line-up with the limitless large line-up. The octet is not a hermaphrodite, but in each of its moments both in one. The few examples we find of the octet in jazz were mostly fundamental, above all those of Charles Mingus, Dave Brubeck, David Murray and Steve Lehman. The trombonist and composer Janning Trumann has already manifested himself in many formations. However, the octet perhaps corresponds to the profundity of his nature more than any other constellation. In his two octet recordings, he intuitively follows the holistic character of the eight. He offers us two different interpretations of the highly symbolic number, which in their essence are mutually dependent. "Fundaments We Share" symbolizes the basic tectonics of the eight, from which all further derivations emanate. "Wem Zeit wie Ewigkeit" puts the eight on its side and pours out into infinity. Music can be so much more than just a sequence of notes, harmonies and bars. Or, to put it in the simple words of Walter Sobchak: "Write down an eight!" Wolf Kampmann