GRAVITATIONS (Live) Haggai Cohen-Milo & James Shipp

• 1 Lacrimosa (Live) 05:29
• 2 Lacrimosa-Epilogue (Live) 02:06
• 3 Salva me (Live) 05:35
• 4 Song Of The Earth (Live) 05:26
• 5 Descending Chords (Live) 10:20
• 6 3+3 (Live) 05:15
• 7 Verdi Transition (Live) 02:45
• 8 Debussy Transition (Live) 02:44
• 9 Like We (Live) 04:32
• Total Runtime 44:12

Info for GRAVITATIONS (Live)

Berlin-based double bassist and composer Haggai Cohen-Milo returns with Gravitations, a new album that pushes classical repertoire into uncharted territory. Out June 13, 2025, and recorded live at Hamburg’s Laeiszhalle, the project features original compositions sparked by works from Mahler, Verdi, and Debussy. But rather than arranging or quoting them, Haggai Cohen-Milo uses these pieces as points of departure, pulling their emotional threads into a new framework shaped by jazz, improvisation, and spoken word. The album brings together an exceptional group of collaborators, including saxophonists Emma Rawicz and Maria Kim Grand, trumpeters Philip Dizack and Justin Stanton, and poet-performer Stimulus.

At its core, Gravitations is about building community through music – a space where classical and jazz traditions don’t just coexist but are pushed into new territory. Recorded in one-take sessions, the album captures the risk and immediacy of live performance, embracing its imperfections and intensity. Rather than blending genres, Gravitations pulls them apart and reassembles them into something unpredictable and alive. It’s a record that asks for close listening, reframing the familiar in ways that feel both personal and unfamiliar.

Haggai Cohen-Milo, double bass
James Shipp, vibraphone
Emma Rawicz, saxophone

Haggai Cohen-Milo
is a virtuoso of the double-bass and an explorer of interdisciplinary performance. For over ten years he’s been collaborating with dancers and choreographers to create a common language for interdisciplinary performance in sound, movement, and visual art. His composition and directorial work includes dance, theater and movie scores alongside his own music releases. In 2019 Haggai became the musical curator of FRAMED Berlin. He is the winner of the ECHO award in 2018 for his work with the Omer Klein Trio of which he’s been a member since 2010.

Haggai leads a robust career as a touring and recording artist. He performs extensively both nationally and internationally, playing to captivated audiences in many countries in Europe, the Americas, the Middle East, and Asia. He has recorded as leader and sideman/co-leader on over thirty albums working closely with his collaborators, for labels such as Warner, Fresh Sound – New Talent, John Zoran’s prestigious Tzadik, and more. Originally from Israel, Haggai moved to the states in his 20s to earn his B.M. from the New England Conservatory in Boston. He moved to Germany from New York City in 2017 and currently resides in Berlin.

“When I was eleven years old I got into music because I wanted to play with my friends. The reason I’m a musician today isn’t because I felt some higher calling to be one, but because playing music with friends was and still the greatest source of joy and satisfaction for me. To this day the driving force behind my music is closeness and connection to others, my contemporaries, my collaborators and my audiences.”

This album contains no booklet.