Our Bio
Music and Frienship
The UJIG project was born in 2014, during a series of workshops held by the Berklee College of Music at Umbria Jazz Clinics in Perugia, with the aim of creating an international group that could mix different genres, from jazz to rock, whilst keeping a strong European identity. The band consists of Austrian musician Konstantin Kräutler and Italian musicians Edoardo Maggioni and Marco Leo, and Cesare Pizzetti. In 2014, the quartet recorded "8 Out Of 8", their first album eight original tracks of experimental jazz, with fusion and rock influences. Over the last 10 years, UJIG has played live in several clubs and jazz festivals in Italy, Austria and Germany.In 2017 and 2018 Ujig recorded "The necessity of Falling" Album, 8 tracks with jazz, rock and prog influences.In 2021 has recorded their third album "Ujigami", released on October 8th 2021. On the track "Tano" Ujig featured the Italian trumpet player @Fabrizio Bosso, and on the tracks "Odota" and "Pohjoinen" featured the Bow Tie Orchestra from Moscow.in 2023-24 ujig released"Attimi" a prog jazz suite with Marco Rigamonti and Alessio Bertallot. In 2024 naked skin with Franca Barone for an advertisement of a Fashion Brand from Milano. In 2025 their 4th album "Delta" has been released, both digitally and vinyls and CD on the June the 6th. In 2026 the band has released Deep Dub Bop a brand new tune for Miles Davis' 100th birthday anniversary and in September Zoroark version of Zorua, a song of Delta.
The stories behind our music
8 out of 8
Our first meeting...
During the Perugia clinics, Marco and Konstantin had agreed to meet around Christmas and make a recording with some songs and ideas that we would develop between July and December. The original idea was for double bass player Yoki Lee Shimitzu (JP), who was at the Perugia clinics in 2014, to join us. However, it wasn't easy to come to Italy from Japan for a recording. So Konzi decided to call Tobi, a bassist friend with whom he had already shared many projects. But a couple of weeks before coming to Milan, Tobi backed out. So Konzi asked David Ambrosh to join the project. In the meantime, after Edo also gave his approval to the project, we had developed some ideas for themes and structures without thinking too much about the arrangements that would come later. So right after Christmas we met here in Milan. It was a Saturday; on Sunday we had organized the concert at 44 Gatti in Monza with Paolo Tomelleri. We met up with him on Sunday afternoon, and that evening we went to play our first real live show together, without ever having played all four of us together. The concert was really beautiful, first because the great Paolo Tomelleri was able to bring out the best in us, and second because we had the tension and concentration to give our best.
The Recording Days...
The next day we started working on the album. We spent about a week arranging the songs, day and night, until Friday, when we played all the songs we'd developed in the previous days live for the first time. The venue was Tortuga, near the studio. It was December, and while loading the car to go home, David, sweating, caught a very high fever, which jeopardized the actual recording scheduled for the following days. Edo's father, who is a very good doctor, prescribed him very strong medication, so that David, although still with a slight fever, was still able to get back on his feet to record. So, right after New Year's Eve, working in the studio 20 hours a day, we managed to bring all the recordings home. Only a couple of solos were missing, which we then overdubbed. When we finished recording, while we were listening and thinking about what to call the album, Konzi said, since there were 8 songs, we should call the album "8 out of something..." So I thought of calling the album 8 out of 8, but turning the second 8 around to symbolize that those 8 songs were born from the infinite possibilities that we had in front of us just a few days before. The idea for the cover then came to Edo, who with Andrea Camboni, who designed all our covers except for Attimi and Delta, created a similarity between a Rorschach inkblot, making our faces the negative of the inkblot. There are many other stories about our first recording... maybe we'll write them soon...
The Necessity of Falling
From 2015 to 2018
We met many times after finishing recording the first album, both in Milan, Dorbirn, and Vienna. In the meantime, some of us had become, and some were about to become, dad .... In these meetings, we developed the ideas and arrangements for our second album.
We tried very hard to organize concerts like the Jazz Club in Lindau and the Poolbar Festival in Feldkirch, or the Mingus in Carnate, or the Na da Mas in Monza, precisely so we could play our songs from the old and new albums before recording them.
Meanwhile, Konzi had told me about the concept of rhythmic layers, so we developed the idea of Raat Ta Asmaan, in which three different layers of 3/8 and 7/8 move over a cycle of 21/8, and a polymeter composed of groups of 5/8 and 6/8. Then we had the opportunity to play at Jazz Alguer in Alghero, Sardinia. There, in one of our usual philosophical (or almost!) conversations, we were talking about improvisation as something that could only be the result of a need for communication between people who were improvising together. So we created an analogy with a rule written in creation that is often ignored: everything that is created must necessarily disappear, it is a condition of coming to light. Thus, music and improvisation appear and consequently disappear; thus, the quantity and quality of notes, the rhythm, are the consequence of what people play together. And this is precisely what somehow makes music sacred without being sacrilegious. At least we hope that through our music, it solicits the questions that each of us sooner or later asks ourselves. Thus, the name "The Necessity of Falling" came about: the fall of things that exist, but which can fall precisely because they exist.
The Recording Days...
In 2018 we met again in Bluescore and recorded the 8 songs that later become "The necessity of Falling"
At that time, I was becoming interested in Japanese drawings made with natural inks on vegetable paper. So, as always, Andrea Camboni began studying how to draw in the same way. The idea was to paint a samurai who conveyed the idea of tranquility. The samurai was intent on observing the unfolding of the world around him, trying to grasp the essence of the cycle of creation and destruction, grasping its profound meaning, without feeling uneasy but rather finding the calm that comes from knowing and understanding its profound meaning. We then chose to quote Boethius directly in Latin on the album, which stated:
"No way of teaching, in fact, reaches the soul more easily than that which passes through the ears. Therefore, when, through them, rhythms and melodies have penetrated to the depths of the soul, there is no doubt that they influence and shape it in accordance with their nature.("Nulla enim magis ad animum disciplinis via, quam auribus patet. Cum ergo per eas rhythmi modique ad animum usque descenderint, dubitari non potest, quin aequo modo mentem atque ipsa sunt afficiant atque conforment.")