Summer 2022
Berlin
I want to quickly show you something and tell you how grateful I am to be working along incredibly talented artists and creatives that try to push the boundaries of music and events. In between my trip to Colombia and our crazy Oslo To Istanbul project with Pink Alligator, I was asked to work with XJAZZ! Berlin.
In 2021, when everything was shut down due to Covid 19, a small group of musicians from Berlin managed to still organize their favorite festival: XJAZZ! … this time around in a digital only version: 10 days, 20 concerts, performed, filmed and live streamed on the highest level. Back then, I was a small part of the production, mainly filming BTS, editing and creating small formats for social media.
2022 was different. The city opened up, concerts were possible and XJAZZ! decided to go big. They asked me to come up with ideas how to document the festival and create something special for the online world. After a few setbacks, quite some chaos and going back and forth, I was able to put an amazing team together with the PINK ALLIGATOR COLLECTIVE to film an aftermovie, document the festival from the perspectives of artists, visitors and organizers and build a set and recording studio for live sessions, special formats and interviews in the office of the CEO of Flux FM. In 5 days we created 15TB of incredible video footage, recorded both sound and image of 15 artists in our studio and created content that would last XJAZZ! for a whole year.
Creative Director:
Heiko Ritt (@chasingtales.official)
Production:
PINK ALLIGATOR COLLECTIVE (@_pinkalligator)
Xjazz! Production:
Anastasiia Pokaz (@nastyasupernastya)
Camera:
Rebecca Rütten (@becky_fuchs)
Gildo Cassimo (@photospokus)
Leonard Vee (leonardvee.visuals)
Lucas Betz (@lash_production)
Camera Assistant:
Emma Knapp (@emxvk)
Production Assistant:
Penny Monogiou (@pennymonogiou)
Editors:
Heiko Ritt (@chasingtales.official)
Leonard Vee (@leonardvee.visuals)
Thamina Rastagar O´Rourke (@thamotion)
Sound (Fluxbau Sessions):
Eric Timmann (@erictimmann)
Music:
MAGRO (@magro_music)
Funding:
Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Europa
Media Partners:
Flux FM
Taz
Jazzthing
HHV
One of the things we are most proud of, is the DISTANT DUO format. We invited artists from war torn country Ukraine tosend us pieces of music. XJAZZ! lineup artists improvise to these pieces to create a powerful collaboration project between Ukrainian and worldwide musicians, which is aimed to build strong musical and mental bridges between them.
Find more on xjazz.com