Science and pedagogics:

His penchant for languages led Wolfgang Aulke to study to study German and ancient philology at the University of Münster from 1978 to 1985; after his teacher’s training and subsequent work as an instrumental teacher for guitar and saxophone, he was accepted as civil servant in 1989.

From 1989 to 1998 he worked as a high school teacher at the Antonianum Vechta high school and from 1998 he joined the school management as coordinator and step leader.

In 2004 Wolfgang Aulke moved from Lower Saxony to Schleswig-Holstein and worked as deputy headmaster at the Gymnasium Schloss Plön until 2020. At the same time, he took over the management of the Latin Commission at the Schleswig-Holstein Ministry of Education from 2011 to 2020 and worked as a part-time specialist supervisor for Schleswig-Holstein.

Music

Seeing his father's rare guitar playing Wolfgang Aulke learned to play the classical guitar from the age of twelve and was fascinated by the music of guitarist Andre Segovia; one of his teachers was Peter Röseler. From the age of 16, the electric guitar was added to his pool of instruments, which he used in various rock and jazz formations. In 1980 he came aware of the tenor saxophone across with the music of John Coltrane and Michael Brecker. Spontaneously, he bought a Selmer Mark VII and began to practice autodidactically. Regular visits to the North Sea Jazz Festival, which took place in The Hague at the time, deepened access to this instrument. Studies with Wolfgang Engstfeld in Cologne from the mid-1980s refined his technique and the range of usability of this instrument. Since 1987 he has also played a soprano saxophone at recordings and concerts.

During this decade he was a member of numerous formations dedicated to prog rock or jazz rock. At the same time he worked with Wolfgang Köster (Munster) from 1978 to 1990 in the guitar duo "Sequoia", which made numerous appearances on stages and festivals from Frankfurt to Denmark.

In order to expand his range, he acquired a baritone saxophone from Peter Neff in Cologne in 1989. With this instrument he became a member of the big band »Blasnost« (Osnabrück), which won the competition »Jazz-Podium Niedersachen« with compositions by Peter Witte and Robert Kretschmar in 1992, 1994 and 1996.

Numerous band projects followed, including an a cappella ensemble, until Wolfgang Aulke joined the big band »Jazzreaktor« together with the pianist Lars Scheffel in 2007 and, a few years later, took over the musical direction together with him. To this day, this formation plays compositions by the two conductors in annual concert projects.

A new field opened up to him in 2010. As a baritone saxophonist he played chamber music in the quartet »flute&saxes«. Until 2020, the quartet gave numerous concerts with unusual and new arrangements of old masters such as Bach, Byrd, Piazzolla and many others, written by the alto saxophonist of the quartet, Uwe Leuenhagen, as well as own compositions by Wolfgang Aulke. From 2017 he also used his double bass saxophone (Tubax).

In 2010 Wolfgang Aulke joined the field of home recording. With his recording studio he has since produced music recordings as stream, CDs and music videos. In the same year, after almost 20 years, he met the pianist Andreas Schwienhorst, with whom he had already played in various formations in the 1980s. They founded the duo »seesalzjazz«, which since then has performed on stage with their own compositions and jazzy arrangements of serious music.

In addition to the »Jazzreactor« and »seesalzjazz«, the current projects also include the soul band "Baltic Soul Attack" under the direction of Volker Trempler as well as various blues bands.