An Interview with Markus Müller about the book FMP: The Living Music, reviewed here.
By Martin Schray
and Paul Acquaro
Mr. Müller, the FMP exhibitions in Munich in 2017 and in Berlin in 2018
were a wonderfully created and fantastic look back at the wok of FMP. How
and when did the decision to also do a book come about?
Funny enough it was just the other way around: I wanted to work on an FMP
book for the longest time, but never having really published a book without
an exhibition driving that kind of effort, I never made it across the
initial, the essential first threshold. Okwui Enwezor simply had enough of
me just talking about it and asked me to realize an exhibition on FMP at
Haus der Kunst, the accompanying catalog, that was his rational, would take
care of my book idea, period. After Okwui was, as I would say, forced to
leave the Haus, the funding for the book was in administrative hibernation.
You mention in the introduction that Machine Gun may have been the first
recording you heard from FMP. At the time did you think about the label
being somewhat special or were you just listening to an album?
Yes, it was something special. Maybe for all the wrong reasons though. I
was very much into what was called Heavy Metal and Blues. I oscillated, I
am not ashamed to say, between “Kiss Alive!” and Hound Dog Taylor, electric
Blues. We are talking 1975, so one year before the Ramones debut. And I
just connected immediately to Machine Gun because over the intense
hyper-energy-level it exuded. This thing was just so on fire and it still
is. It was clear that I had to follow up on this, hear more, learn more
about this.
Was there something about FMP that interested you the most? The concerts,
the festivals, the recordings, or possibly something else?
I grew up in the Ruhrgebiet so it was records before concerts, Berlin was
not only 600 km away, there was also this border…later on I got almost
addicted to listening to the live experience, no not almost I got addicted,
especially to the experience of being able to listen to a set of musicians
repeatedly, a.k.a. the Workshop Freie Musik-configuration, so I got
addicted up to a point where I couldn’t afford to travel to listen to
FMP-related musics anymore and had to realize that writing about this stuff
will not pay the rent…thus I had to get my first job at the Karl Ernst
Osthaus-Museum in Hagen.
Especially during the so-called cooperative period, there were sometimes
tensions at FMP because Peter Brötzmann came from a political background at
the beginning, while Alexander von Schlippenbach was rather apolitical.
Despite Brötzmann's influence, would you say that the political became less
and less important for FMP over the years?
I strongly do believe that everything that FMP has done was political and
it is political till this day. FMP has been an example for
self-empowerment, so for me the political has multiple implications and
this example of self-empowerment is central for my understanding of what
politics can do. And yes there were tensions but fascinating enough these
guys still play together every once in a while and I think there is also a
lesson to be learned from that.
FMP was very present in West Germany, especially in the late 1970s and the
1980s, because the label could - as you say - set accents. You briefly
mention that there was also a discussion that FMP fuelled displacement
struggles. What exactly is meant by that, and to what extent would you
agree?
I think that Jost Gebers for example, always wanted to include, to present
musics that are contemporary and relevant, no matter where they came from.
This necessarily had to be in sharp contrast with the intrinsic interest of
any musician in an economy that makes it almost impossible to make a living
by “just” playing your music. You always want to be the one who gets the
gig, especially in your “own cooperative”. This let to internal conflicts.
If you are outside of the FMP-bubble the sheer massiveness and number of
FMP-related events, presentations, and publications condemns the outsider
to think: “Why always them, why always FMP?”. And as the economic situation
was and is limited by definition, more FMP was perceived to mean there is
less for others. The Kölner Stadtgarten is the prime example of an
initiative that was begun, I believe, very well knowing the FMP-example but
also in stark delimitation to FMP and thus managed to out-live FMP as it
took necessary steps that in some ways even reached further than FMP did.
The lesson being: real-estate is real.
One chapter that is certainly important, because there is a focus on a
rather underrepresented aspect, is the chapter on FMP and women. You say
(quite rightly) that FMP as an organization has never been feminist, but
proportionately has given many women opportunities to present themselves.
Was anything else beyond that even possible at that time?
Yes, that is a very good question and I believe you are pointing in the
right direction. I just think that as a white privileged male today one
always has to acknowledge that these privileges are part of what I would
call systemic racism and systemic misogyny. One has to raise these
questions and yes, I am pro-Quota.
In this context, do you think a chapter on sexual diversity would have been
useful? Cecil Taylor and Irène Schweizer, for example, never made a secret
of this.
Absolutely! And I believe Christian Broecking outstanding and exemplary
biography of Irène Schweizer does an excellent job in this regard. And it
should be done and it has to be done. Having said that, I hope there will
be more studies, books, research focused on FMP, and other initiatives like
FMP covering this specific question and then some. My book is far from
trying to be definitive, there was only so much that I could do. I wanted
to introduce FMP in a way that makes it possible to understand that this is
an important history. If others pick this up and do more and better in the
future: all power to them!
One chapter deals exclusively with FMP and border crossings. Could FMP
perhaps be described as the first real example of globalization in jazz?
I am not sure about that, the question makes me think immediately of Joe
Zawinul, Joe Harriott, Django Reinhardt, Gábor Szabó etc. etc. I also
believe that AACM did similar things, integrating dance, performance, and
also painting, visual arts and I think that I believe that the arts always
intermixed with Fluxus being the one moment were things really crystallized
and Fluxus was definitely global. And that is, in part, were FMP is coming
from. Plus, let us be clear, when you live in a village, and Wuppertal,
sorry, was a village compared to Manhattan, and you have Brötzmann, Kowald,
Carl, and Reichel on the one hand and Pina Pausch on the other hand, how
could these folks miss each other, they had to collaborate at one point.
Some chapters, such as FMP and the GDR, also live on almost unbelievable
anecdotes. Were there also some that you had to leave out because they
simply didn't fit in, but that would have been well worth telling?
Yes, when you work on something for such a long time, people begin to tell
you stories because they know that you will not publish them, I think this
is a matter of simple trust. And in some cases, for example in all
questions of publishing stuff about FMP finances, I cleared that. And on
the other hand I was never asked not to write something or to delete
something. In other words, I am sure there are things not in the book that
are worth telling but this whole brick is also about reduction and
commensurability.
Olaf Rupp
said in an interview that Jost Gebers has achieved incredible things for
improvised music. Many people (including himself) had complained about FMP
in the 90s because they thought they were not very open to new musicians.
Today, he sees it differently: it was good not to change a successful
model. But more importantly, he said, everyone has benefited indirectly
from the FMP structures, that the FMP existed, mainly because of its
structures. Many musicians forget this and lightly brush it aside today. Do
you see it that way as well?
I think I kind of answered that already. One of the problems with a success
story like FMP is that those who feel they are outside the loop always want
in, always want more. Hell, the ones who were in the loop always wanted
more, they felt they were not getting enough. This dilemma cannot be
solved, with limited funding for example, come limited possibilities of
presentation and representation. I, on the other hand, think that it is
very remarkable indeed how much diversity there was inside of that FMP
fold.
Regarding the years 2000 to 2009, you only refer to an essay by Wolf
Kampmann, which rather reflects Jost Gebers' view. Why not let Helma
Schleif, who took over the FMP after Gebers' withdrawal, have her say as
well (even if only with a reference)?
In this specific case there are not only different views but there was also
a lawsuit up to the Supreme Court of Appeal. Jost Gebers has won all these
hearings and has rightfully cancelled the licence agreement with Helma
Schleif due to the ongoing violation of the initial contract. This is the
factual side of the affair and I really had no interest in repeating things
that are easily available online etc. Once you are in court together,
niceties usually end.
I think it was a mistake on both parts to hope that FMP could somehow go on
and continue as if the world had not changed fundamentally. Gebers has
received the first institutional funding for FMP only in 1989. After 1989
things changed dramatically and in the funding of the arts in general,
worlds were turned upside down.
Having said that, I think that the years 2000 (and TMM Compact 2000 with
Olaf Rupp by the way, is in the book) to 2009 produced a couple of great
concerts but also failed to add a new chapter to the FMP legacy and I am
happy if someone proofs me wrong here.
It is remarkable that Brötzmann’s Chicago Tentet started in 1998 and ended
in 2013, maybe that was a bit like the AACM going to New York and then
eventually to Paris etc. What does it mean that one of the most costly (and
successful) FMP-related endeavours happened while FMP changed stewardship
and when they played Berlin, twice I think, they played Jazzfest Berlin
1999, I can’t remember where they played in 2012?
Do you think something like FMP would be possible again today? Or have the
social and production possibilities simply changed so much today that it
would no longer be possible?
I think Berlin has an Improv Scene that outnumbers the FMP years in terms
of number of players and numbers of concerts by far. There is also a brand
new young audience that is very diversified and most significant difference
to the “classic FMP years”, there are a lot more women in the audience
today.
Maybe an obvious final question: Do you have something like favorite albums
in the FMP catalog?
Yes. I give you a couple, but be sure, tomorrow I would give you ten more…
Schlippenbach Trio: Elf Bagatellen; Hans Reichel: Coco Bolo Nights;
Brötzmann Trio feat. Albert Mangelsdorff: FMP 0030/40/50; Peter Kowald:
Duos Europe - America – Japan and Was Da Ist; Leo Smith/Peter Kowald/
Günter Sommer: Touch The Earth – Break the Shells; COWWS beginning with : 2
Quintette and then Seite A Seite A and Grooves’n’Loops; Irène Schweizer
with Joëlle Léandre: Cordial Gratin, King Übü Orchestrü: Music is Music is,
Stabbins Tibbett Moholo: Tern; Heiner Goebbels/Alfred 23 Harth: Vom
Sprengen des Gartens, Cecil Taylor: In Berlin ’88, Minton/Butcher/Hirt: Two
Concerts
Thank you very much for the interview, Mr Müller.