Wolfgang Ambros

An "unplugged" musical journey through time with the legendary Austrian singer-songwriter Wolfgang Ambros (vocals, guitar, harmonica), Günter Dzikowski (keyboards and vocals), and Roland Vogl (guitar, bass, and vocals).

That Wolfgang Ambros' music has soul is undeniable. Experiencing him like this—musically reduced to the acoustic guitar, with Günter Dzikowski on keyboards and Roland Vogl on bass—is particularly fascinating. Ambros has been delighting audiences in this format for over a decade. A special concert experience in exclusive theaters and smaller venues.

The renaissance of one of the most important musicians and singers of all time, the great Johnny Cash, was sparked by the essentially obvious idea of ​​sitting him down with just an acoustic guitar and letting him play. Without any "unplugged" nonsense: reducing it to the essentials, searching for the essence of their music, has done many artists good, provided their music actually has an essence, a soul.

There's no doubt that Wolfgang Ambros's music has soul. A prickly one perhaps, a great one certainly. This man's musical merits are legion; hardly anyone has sung such words about quintessentially Viennese and Austrian sensibilities as he has, so aptly that they endure for decades as commentaries on a world that, at its core, remains the same. Hardly anyone has managed to combine the existential (love, death, and everything else) with lightness, full-throated "Schmäh" as he has – just think, as one of countless examples, of "Es lebe der Zentralfriedhof" (Long Live the Central Cemetery). And no one has taken on the work of such great artists as Bob Dylan, Hans Moser, Tom Waits, or Neil Young as he has, without ever producing embarrassments or leaving behind the stale feeling of standing on the shoulders of giants.

It's a treasure chest that creaks open and gradually reveals its treasures when you put Wolfgang Ambros on stage with "just" his voice, a guitar, and the musicians Günter Dzikowski and Roland Vogl at his side. Dzikowski, a long-time musician with the No. 1 from the Vienna Woods, and Roland Vogl, who has been touring with Ambros for years, know the extensive Ambros song catalog (almost) as well as their "boss," and yet it is also a stimulating journey of discovery for the three performers to rediscover and re-discover many of these songs in an intimate setting. "Even big numbers like "Zentralfriedhof" or "Heit drah I mi ham" suddenly become immediately tangible again," says Ambros.

Audiences and critics have responded to the previous Ambros pur! evenings with corresponding enthusiasm; when else do you get the chance to be so close to a giant of Austrian pop music like Wolfgang Ambros and his songs, many of which have long since become folk songs of a different kind.

Program and cast