Dive into the world of german jazz!
What is jazz? How did this music come to Germany? Why did the Nazis see jazz as a danger? And how did jazz achieve its great breakthrough? For the film JAZZFIEBER | THE STORY OF GERMAN JAZZ, Reinhard Kungel and his team went in search of clues and accompanied the film composer Peter Thomas and the jazz legends Rolf Kühn, Max Greger, Hugo Strasser, Paul Kuhn and Coco Schumann during their lifetime.
I loved this film. It took me on a journey back in time to the Germany of my parents. Although the country was destroyed, this film, its music, the performances of these primal stones of jazz radiate an uncanny energy and joie de vivre. The film is a piece of contemporary history – be sure to watch it.
“Everything you need to avoid poring over a thousand notes is in there,” he says. Immerse yourself in a wonderful movie full of passion and music!
In 1968, Rialto Film released “Van de Velde: The Perfect Marriage” in German cinemas, followed in ’69 by “Van de Velde: The Life of Two – Sexuality in Marriage”; enlightenment films as they were en vogue at the time.
“Natasha (Main Theme)”, recorded by the Peter Thomas Sound Orchester, is the main theme, a melancholic spherical instrumental piece. Based on samples from the original, a new version has been created. Together with a modern groove, radiant backing vocals by Frieder Hepting and – of course – soulful guitar and keyboard parts, “Natascha” merges present and past into a new one not heard before.
“Faded Out/Faded In (Ausgeblendet/Eingeblendet)”. The exhibition at the Jewish Museum Frankfurt uses film examples to trace the previously unwritten film history of the German Federal Republic. Also included is the film “Es war mir ein Vergnügen” with music by Peter Thomas. Here is an excerpt from the film with Esther Ofarim and the song “Das ist meine Liebe”.
Thanks to a very fruitful collaboration with Golden Ticket Tapes, nine well-known beatmakers reworked and sampled my father’s previously unreleased audio material. The result is a great remix of original tapes from the P.T.S.O. Archive stock, which now sound remixed and sampled in new sounds for the first time. My dad would have been delighted with this new design of his works.
The versatile and creative drummer Claude Bussard plays to selected songs by Peter Thomas and enriches them with his own fills and beats. Our drummer is embedded in a unique animation by the Brazilian animator Lucas Schwantes. He has managed to thematically illustrate and lovingly animate each song. The camera work is done by the wonderful Tina Schück, who brought a lot of patience and tact to the production of the clip.
We have illustrated a total of five titles from films for which Peter Thomas, wrote the music. Would you recognize these melodies?
Here Philip Thomas presents one of the winners of the competition with his prize in person in Berlin. Many thanks to Thomas M. for participating!
The EUROPEAN FILMPHILHARMONIC INSTITUTE inspires its audiences in Germany, Europe and all over the world with the contemporary art of symphonic film music.
Its services range from the research and provision of film and music material to its own creative overall productions of film concerts and film music concerts.
In this context, the EUROPEAN FILMPHILHARMONIC INSTITUTE will sift through, edit and digitally record the existing musical material of the composer Peter Thomas. This will make his musical legacy accessible to a wider audience of artists and art lovers. Many thanks to Beate Warkentien for making this possible.
The collaboration with the European FilmPhilharmonic Institute began 20 years ago. On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the television series RAUMPATROUILLE – DIE PHANTASTISCHEN ABENTEUER DES RAUMSCHIFFES ORION, the feature film version of the cult series was made, which was released in 2003. This was the first German sound film to feature full-length live musical dubbing. The original music has been rearranged for big band and made available for the first time for a live concert. An absolute world premiere! Here are a few impressions from the performance with Peter Thomas live.
“Der Kongress Amüsiert Sich” is a colorful historical and costume film with an all-star cast (Curd Jürgens, Lili Palmer, Gustav Knuth). Filming took place in 1965, mainly in the Vienna Hofburg. The film music was composed by Peter Thomas.
Thanks to detective work in the archives of the late maestro, MuZikBeater has succeeded in making the entire soundtrack of this film available to the public for the first time.
My father has written the music to over 500 movies and among them there are many well known melodies. With this playlist I tried to reproduce the well known titles and at the same time to present less known but absolute bangers. Just listen to it here:
In November 2022 it was spooky in Rothenburg ob der Tauber. “The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism” was shown at the original filming location in Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Directly after the screening of “Die Schlangengrube und das Pendel” (The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism) in the Filmpalast Ballhaus Forum Rothenburg, renowned experts (including Walter Potganski) gave interesting anecdotes about the making of the film. Also in the audience were former extras of the film. The music for this Edgar Allan Poe film adaptation was penned by the great master! Here is the original soundtrack, whose release was personally supervised by my father until shortly before his death:
Afterwards, Walter Potganski (MovieMax) and Ulrich Mannes (SGE- Siggi Götz Entertainement) and their team went out.
We’ll keep you up to date on exciting new projects and upcoming events from Peter Thomas Music.
For licencing or the MuZikBeater label related questions please visit https://muzikbeater.de
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