Original language: German
Lokalteil Wolfratshausen/Bad Tölz 09.12.2024
Challenging Highlight
Lukas Tower Band Takes You Into Exciting Worlds
Gelting – The group’s name harks back to an unusual rehearsal location.
“We once practiced in the tower of St. Luke’s Church in Munich,” revealed flutist Regina Willecke when asked by our newspaper. It has now been four decades since the Lukas Tower Band was founded. Over the years, the lineup has constantly evolved. At their most recent performance at the “Hinterhalt” cultural stage, the six-member ensemble transported the audience into an exciting world full of vocal passion and jazzy sound experiments.
“We’re hard to categorize,” warned band founder Wolfgang Fastenmeier before the first song. Together with bassist Miguel Pires, drummer Thomas Willecke, keyboardist Markus Lamek, and Wolfratshausen-based flutist and saxophonist Regina Willecke, the guitarist rolled out a multi-layered soundscape. Above it all, singer Paola Ottaviani laid her charismatic voice, performing songs in various languages—including one in a Sardinian dialect. “Even most Italians don’t understand it,” said the Italian-born “Hinterhalt” performer.
The English lyrics were easier to follow, some of which drew from the literature of Scottish poet Sir Walter Scott and Renaissance humanist Thomas More. The poignant piece “Sisters” told the blood-soaked tale of a young woman who seeks revenge on her sister’s murderer—her husband—by seducing him and ultimately stabbing him.
What was surprising was that this band-style tragedy wasn’t presented with gloomy, somber tones but rather with an almost danceable groove. It reminded some listeners of the lively tracks of Jethro Tull or songs from early Pink Floyd. “I want to be a tiger instead of a lamb that lets everything happen to it,” guitarist Fastenmeier said defiantly, referencing the poetry of English writer William Blake, who died in 1827.
With so many musical and literary references, some concertgoers left the over two-hour performance with their heads spinning. Nevertheless, the Lukas Tower Band was undoubtedly a sophisticated highlight of the now-concluded PiPaPo Festival.
HANS LIPPERT