Name: Lambert
Nationality: German
Occupation: Composer, improviser, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, producer
Current release: Lambert's new album I Am Not Lambert, featuring GOODWIN, Dekker and Kat Frankie, is out via Clouds Hill. Catch him live on tour at one of these dates.
Recommendations for Berlin, Germany: Donau 115 / Jazz Club
Topic I am passionate about but rarely get to talk about: I have a Podcast for jazz, LK Jazz. It is in German. I talk about my favorite music there with one of my favorite persons.  

If you enjoyed this Lambert interview and would like to know more about his music and upcoming live dates, visit his official homepage. He is also on Instagram, tiktok, bandcamp, and Facebook.

For a deeper dive, read our earlier Lambert interview,  and our conversation with him about improvisation. 



Where does the impulse to create something come from for you? What role do often-quoted sources of inspiration like dreams, other forms of art, personal relationships, politics etc play?

My biggest Inspiration usually comes from just doing stuff regularly. Very proud of my daily creative routine. The thought of being dependent on certain events and Influences to be able to work, frightens me.

Still, good live music can be a great Inspiration. I love to go to the Jazzclub.

For you to get started, do there need to be concrete ideas – or what some have called a 'visualisation' of the finished work? What does the balance between planning and chance look like for you?

I rely on improvisation.

Sometimes I think I have a certain sound in mind, or an idea of how the result will have to sound. Usually the result is not really what I expected, so try not to plan the result too much, the process  usually leads the way.

Is there a preparation phase for your process? Do you require your tools to be laid out in a particular way, for example, do you need to do 'research' or create 'early versions'?

I try to change my tools as much as I can, so I don’t get bored. I believe if you stick too long to the same habits you get in danger to repeat yourself.

Now I have an album written out as sheet music, that isn’t recorded yet. Haven’t done that in a very long time …

Do you have certain rituals to get you into the right mindset for creating? What role do certain foods or stimulants like coffee, lighting, scents, exercise or reading poetry play?

None.

For I Am Not Lambert, what did you start with? If there were conceptual considerations, what were they?

Hard to say. I can’t recall actually.

Might be that I wanted to include a kind of indie-folk singer songwriter sound in my tunes on I am not Lambert.

I bought an old Höfner guitar, that helped us get there.

Tell me a bit about the way the new material developed and gradually took its final form, please.

I recorded a lot of music. Way too many tracks for each tune. I felt something was wrong, so I asked Daniel Schaub what to do with this mess.

He was very good at deciding which tracks to mute, which ones needed to be polished, were I had to invest more work and care, what to leave out and so on. And he played the Höfner guitar way better than me.

So in the end he became the producer of the album. That was great fun!

What makes lyrics good in your opinion? What are your own ambitions and challenges in this regard?

I didn’t write the lyrics on this album. My vocal features Kat Frankie, Goodwin and Dekker wrote their own.

I was happy to observe that my music helped them share life-inspired lyrics. It feels like they all know what they are singing about. So I guess, it is important that the listener believes in the lyrics.

I hate the word authenticity cause it puts too much emphasis on accuracy. I don’t think the public persona of the artist has to be one-to-one the private person behind it, but especially with lyrics I understand that you can relate to a text much better, when you believe in the connection between its content and the person who sings it.

Many writers have claimed that as soon as they enter into the process, certain aspects of the narrative are out of their hands. Do you like to keep strict control or is there a sense of following things where they lead you?

Yes, I agree. I can’t control everything.

I don’t always actively make music. Oftentimes it just happens to me. In my live show I actually search for these moments. I think they can be found in improvisation.

There are many descriptions of the creative state. How would you describe it for you personally? Is there an element of spirituality to what you do?

Yes, this search for the moment I described is probably something like a spiritual journey. I think I experienced this state of a kind of perfection of the moment in which everything seemed possible, but there was no need to control anything, cause the beauty went through you by itself.

Jazz musicians talk about this sometimes as well. In jazz you gain so much knowledge to gain flexibility to be prepared as best as you can for this moment to arrive. And then you let go. You can forget everything for a while and just be some kind of transcendental media or channel.

Once a piece is finished, how important is it for you to let it lie and evaluate it later on? How much improvement and refinement do you personally allow until you're satisfied with a piece?

I usually know in the process.

If it is not good, I don’t waste time on working on it too much to hope that I might like it later on. Doesn’t work for me …

How do you think the meaning, or effect of an individual piece is enhanced, clarified or possibly contrasted by the EPs, or albums it is part of? Does each piece, for example, need to be consistent with the larger whole?

No. You can do what you want.

Usually time sets the frame by itself. So if you work on a album during a certain time, that in itself automatically connects the pieces.

In terms of what they contribute to a song, what is the balance between the composition and the arrangement (including production, mixing and mastering)?  

Writing is king. If that isn’t good, you can’t fix it in the mix or the production or arrangement.

It is easy to check that: write a tune, record it in the worst quality possible. If you still like it, it is good…

Music and the accompanying artwork are often closely related. Can you talk about this a little bit for your current project and the relationship that images and sounds have for you in general?

Now the cover show me being insecure abut my artist persona.

I sometimes ask my self whether the persona I created to find myself musically, can also be in the way to find myself musically … the picture shows that well, I think …

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. Do you personally feel as though writing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn't or wouldn't in more 'mundane' tasks?  

I don’t really understand the question, but I know that making music is not the same as making coffee.

I like to communicate through music, cause in some way I can be more precise than if I were to use words.