Late summer 2014: Almut Schlichting, supported by a composition grant from the Berlin Senate, goes on an expedition through the secular music of the Middle Ages and finds exciting sounds that are more coarse, vital and rhythmical than the music of churches or monasteries. Moreover, she discovers folkoristic song fragments, carnivalistic dance music and bizarre lyrics. Combined with contemporary jazz elements, a new album starts taking shape. Entitled Saints & Fools, it opens the gate to a quixotic medieval world, populated by well-traveled gleemen, jolly cooks, French wolfs, Spanish rabbits, donkeys with mitres, a strong-minded English queen and the saint of coffee houses.

Vocalist Winnie Brückner’s multi-faceted voice, the alto saxophone and bass clarinet’s warm timbres, the rhythm section’s effortlessly tight grooves and the sublime improvisations all help transform the medieval material into fresh, contemporary music for the 21st century.