Fabian Schumann & Cole Whittenburg (GER / USA)

Fabian Schumann plays the zither. Nothing unusual about that, you might think. Except that he doesn’t play the instrument as we know it from traditional folk music. In his hands, the zither can sound like an acoustic guitar one moment and an electric guitar the next, with his influences ranging from jazz to metal. His latest album, Strom, presents the zither as a highly expressive instrument, refreshingly liberated from its Alpine folk tradition.
For their Jazz & The City performance, the atmospheric compositions from Schumann’s debut album are expanded with arrangements created by the duo, as well as classic jazz standards reimagined in a new light. The result is a collage of styles, sounds, and colors that defies expectations—performed on unusual instruments in an equally unusual duo.