2024-01-26 19:06:43
The young man with the blonde pigtails takes a sip of beer before choosing the white farmer. He takes the black one and sets it aside. Then his opponent in the dark hoodie prefers another black pawn and in turn takes a white one. This goes on and on with other characters in the game.
Not every move is immediately useful, but after about five minutes it’s checkmate. The pigtailed one wins. Immediately afterwards his opponent is a young Frenchman who lives in Kreuzberg and who sat down at the table during the first game. He is alone here, like so many on this “Chess and Jazz” evening in the Café Holzmarktperle in the heart of Berlin.
Photo gallery
Jazz and chess meet in the Café Holzmarktperle.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
It’s a bit like playing table football: you watch other players, then you challenge yourself.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
The chess players Esteban Martin from Kreuzberg, Alex Kreisle from Friedrichshain and Norman Ewald, also from Friedrichshain, enjoy the evening.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
Clemens Lotz organizes “Chess & Jazz”.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
Chess & Jazz has been around since 2019.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
The players play without any pressure to succeed. It’s all about having fun.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
In summer the event is so well attended that people even play outside.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
Since Corona, chess has been as popular again as ever.Benjamin Pritzkuleit
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So chess and jazz. Once a month, mostly young people sit here at large and small tables, hunched over black and white boards. There are others around them who watch them, wait patiently and then invite them to play the next game. A bit like table football. At the same time, a band is playing on stage. At the beginning of the evening, the organizer of “Chess and Jazz” asks those in the rows near the stage to only converse quietly.
Why is chess booming?
The organizer is Clemens Lotz. Lotz wears a knight on his chest. The print of a chess piece is clearly visible just above his heart on a beige hoodie. Lotz may dress like that, but he doesn’t come from the chess scene. He is a musician and initiated the “Chess and Jazz” series in 2019. After Corona, the event was even more popular than before. Because, what many people don’t know: Chess experienced a boom during the pandemic.
A lot came together: the successful Netflix series “The Queen’s Gambit” was released in 2020. The lockdowns were imposed. “People were locked up anyway and then played a lot of chess,” says Lotz. Magnus Carlsen became better known. The Norwegian chess player was world chess champion from 2013 to 2023 and is currently world champion in rapid and blitz chess.
Online chess has grown rapidly since Corona. That’s why Carlsen is one of the highest-earning e-athletes. Because: Millions of chess enthusiasts follow the games of their stars on Twitch and other platforms. And chess influencers like the American Levy Rozman are followed by over a million people on Instagram.
The Kalle Zeier Trio is playing this chess evening in the Holzmarktperle. Benjamin Pritzkuleit
The “Chess and Jazz” evening is more relaxed. Here, professionals and beginners play against each other without any pressure to succeed. He wants to “socialize” a little, says the Frenchman from the small table. The braided man and his opponent also know each other from the chess evenings at the Holzmarktperle.
We asked the Frenchman whether playing chess online or on a real board is better. “It depends on the player,” he says. He himself prefers the game in “real life” because this is the “real” game. Two musicians in their mid-40s also came. They are there for the first time and would like to play chess, but they had imagined the event to be smaller. But they also like the music.
Jazz is “very experimental outsider music”. The chess players don’t seem like outsiders at all. The chess players here are open, wearing earrings or casual hats on their heads. They have nothing in common with the cliché of the pimply, introverted nerd who would rather spend his free time thinking about chess moves than meeting girls.
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Who actually plays chess?
Speaking of girls. Only around 20 percent of the 70 or so visitors to the Holzmarktperle are women. But that’s not so little when you consider that chess is a male domain. Men also win the big tournaments. This surprises even someone who has been observing the chess scene for a few years now, someone like Clemens Lotz: “Chess is a mental exercise,” he says, and then speculates, “Maybe it’s because of the funding.” With “Chess & Jazz”. he wants to create a “diverse” event.
Almost all the seats in the café are occupied by chess players. They even play outside in the summer. But now it’s over for now. Because the Senate no longer wants to support “Chess and Jazz” with funding. Organizer Lotz is looking for new sponsors – the band costs a lot of money.
Even before the pandemic, being a musician took a lot of energy, says Lotz. “You have a master’s degree, sit in the car with your drums, squeeze through city traffic, work seven hours – and at the end you earn 60 euros.” That wasn’t enough for Lotz. When Corona came, he noticed that he almost felt better without playing concerts. Lotz drew the conclusions and concentrated on jazz.
Many people hug him that evening. They have come to play something as old-fashioned (compared to e-games like Counter-Strike or events like escape rooms) as chess. But they also came to hear live music. Jazz, of all things, which does not contain any electronic sounds at all. It seems: What was uncool yesterday is hype today.
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