The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble

Their mutant jazz slithers and slides, each song a delicately painful little story of heartache, hope and perseverance. These are soundtracks to non-existing movies, inspired by the worlds of Hieronymus Bosch, Pablo Picasso, and Francisco Goya. Jason Kohnen (aka Bong-Ra) and Gideon Kiers, both graduates of the School of Arts, started The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble around the turn of the century, creating new soundtracks to silent movies like FW Murnau's Nosferatu and Fritz Lang's Metropolis. The audio/visual concept behind the band grew to incorporate "visual" music performed alongside existing film fragments to intensify the audio. Philadelphia filmmakers and surrealist animators The Quay Brothers were also a big influence on the duo's early music.