RUBRIKE
Peter Havlicek
Guitarist and Viennese
Schrammelmusik musician
by CORINNA BERGER“Schrammelmusik was pretty
much announced dead - but it
will live on!”
Peter Havlicek feels happiest when he’s on
stage, strumming his guitar. When the crowd
is roaring with laughter, hanging on his every
note, he knows he is making them happy
too. “That’s the most wonderful thing –
when the crowd is enthusiastic about our
music,” he says with a boyish grin.
Havlicek plays Wiener Schrammelmusik- a Viennese style of sentimental dance
music and songs of the Heuriger wine
taverns. He discovered his passion for this
sort of music when he was doing his
compulsory year of civilian service at a
retirement home. He brought his guitar
and played for the residents, and, soon,
they started to sing along. “The way the el-
derly women sang some of these old
songs was so beautiful and so pure, it
deeply fascinated me.”
A Schrammelkapelle (Austrian folk band)
is typically made up of two violins, a G clari-
net, a button accordion, and a double-
necked contraguitar. At its best, the music
is melodious and tinged with ironic melan-
choly, with close harmonies and technical
virtuosity of which performers are justly
proud. It took Havlicek five years to master
the Kontragitarre, which has bass strings as
well as the usual six. Today, he is part of at
least 10 musical ensembles.
One of them, the Neue Wiener Concert
Schrammeln, celebrated its 20th anniver-
sary in 2015.
Havlicek’s love for the traditional
Viennese songs, the Wienerlieder, is one
of the many reasons he feels so deeply
rooted here. “Schrammelmusik originated
in the city I was born in. This is my home.
I love Vienna, because it is so open and
worldly, but still has its quirks. It has a real
sense of coziness.”
Havlicek also loves jazz, something he
discovered very young. And he long
dreamed of finding a way to bring jazz and
Schrammelmusik together. But first, he
needed to truly understand both genres.
“You can’t just take music from some place
in the world and mix in other musical ingre-
dients at random. The music would lose its
roots. It is important to be able to feel
where the music stems from.”
Today, his many musical projects enable
him to travel to more than 30 countries.
But he always loves to come back. “Vienna
is still the musical capital of the world.”