Interview with Piotr Turkiewicz (Jazztopad)

Piotr Turkiewicz

By David Cristol

In November 2025, the 22nd edition of Jazztopad took place in Wrocław, Poland, with David Murray, Wadada Leo Smith, Midori Takada, Marta Sánchez, Camila Nebbia, Kahil El’Zabar, Jakob Bro, Immanuel Wilkins, Joanna Duda, Xhosa Cole, Jeremy Rose, Luke Stewart, Charles Lloyd and others performing. Artists from a varied geographical provenance and exhibiting a wide stylistic scope performed. A strong Polish presence was felt, both with local string ensembles and at improvised sessions. We asked programmer Piotr Turkiewicz about how it began, from a small festival to one of the leading music celebrations in Europe, with a focus on unusual settings, unprecedented encounters, premieres, commissions, partnerships with faraway organizations (Canada, Australia) and doing a New York edition.

David Cristol: how did it all begin, when did you join the festival and become its artistic director ?

Piotr Turkiewicz: I started collaborating with what was then called Wroclaw Philharmonic (now National Forum of Music) in 2006. There is another festival here, a classical music festival, Wratislavia Cantans, which is one of the biggest classical festivals focused on the human voice. I was asked to help out the artistic director of the festival, who was British conductor Paul McCreesh. That's how I got associated with this institution that was running this classical music festival and was also planning to build the Narodowe Forum Muzyki – a new concert hall. I started traveling a lot. The old venue had a festival with the same name, Jazztopad, which ran for three years. It was honestly quite cheesy, jazzy symphonic music, swinging double basses, this kind of vibe. After the third edition I was asked by then director Andrzej Kosendiak if I wanted to take over and develop it. That's how it started.

That was the third edition, and last year was the twenty-second.

PT: I've been doing this for nineteen years, which doesn't feel like it because it's been changing so much. The core idea is still there, which means pushing the program as far as I can. I want to get rid of the « jazz » in the name at some point because it took a long time for people to come and trust the festival choices rather than the « jazz » brand. We started commissioning new music, which is a big part of the festival. Since there was an institution behind it, which had resident ensembles, we started commissioning works for them, symphony orchestras, chamber, cello quartet, string quartet, choir, chamber orchestra. Jazztopad is part of it because it's under the same umbrella. We started using those ensembles as part of the festival. I believe that's how the festival started to grow because there were a lot of artists who were challenged and interested in doing something different. 

Wadada Leo Smith and Jakob Bro. Photo Joanna Stoga

Is that where the connection with the string ensembles come from?

PT: Sure. I used to play cello, and played at my first edition. The connection with strings and especially with the cello is always there, somewhere. But it just started growing like crazy at some point, which was a beautiful thing because when we started, I was designing the poster, going around the city with flyers and so on. We invited Kenny Wheeler, whose music I remembered from childhood. He was one of the first artists I recognized as a kid. I got in touch with him and said, « we have a festival, it's super small and we have no money. Would you like to come? » And he came. I was about trying to talk to artists, not go through agencies. Even though it got bigger, we still have a direct connection with artists, it's really about the relationship with folks. The Jakob Bro piece with Wadada that you heard would not have happened otherwise.

It was an unusual gig for Wadada as part of his declared last tour in Europe.

PT: It's a combination between trying to fit into what they do and also take them out of it for a couple of days. We often fly people over just for what they do here. One of the breakthroughs was, we did the last concert by Sonny Rollins. We started building a relationship with Charles Lloyd, which ended up being a lot of commissions, and his Wild Man Dance album being a live recording at the festival. And we had a beautiful collaboration with Wayne Shorter, he wrote music for wind ensemble for the festival. So it started to grow even though we had a terrible concert hall, an old communist building of about 400 seats, with a terrible sound and smell. People didn’t like to go there, we couldn’t sell tickets. That's why we started house concerts. We needed to go out of this hall to people's houses and establish a connection with the audience. We needed to find another way of presenting the music. It's been thirteen, maybe fourteen years that house concerts are happening. Every year it's different places, except for two houses where we come back to. Two amazing houses and people who've been with us almost from the beginning. Fans of the festival like to celebrate, they need that kind of space, they need to be there. That's like a feast, a wedding. You go in there and you're like, « Jesus, incredible ! » You don’t know who’s gonna play until you’re attending. It’s eight different houses over two weekends, with three or more sets in each.

Camila Nebbia Presencia. Photo Slawek Przerwa

How long has the Narodowe Forum Muzyki been in operation ?

PT: Ten years. It was quite a challenge, moving from a small hall to this place. We suddenly needed to fill 1400 seats. Actually, the whole venue is 1,800 seats. Suddenly four times more people. 


I thought the reversed stage felt and sounded better than the opening and closing evenings in the traditionally-shaped room.  

PT: I like it much more, it’s my favorite setup. It's more intimate and closer. I always address this division between stage and audience, this artificial separation. Most artists want to be close to the audience. Some don't care, but some do. I'm trying to work with those who care. So we found this setup, and I thought this is beautiful, better for the music that we present. Of course, there are bigger names in the program too, but even David Murray doesn't usually sell out venues like this. This year, last year, three years ago, everything was sold out. And when you look at the how the tickets are selling, the most challenging and unknown acts are selling first. Which is incredible.

David Murray Quartet. Photo Slawek Przerwa

You built an audience who is open to new propositions.

PT: It took a long time. Between the house concerts and what happens at the club at night, it helped push things further. We push further every year, a little bit. The first couple of years were hard because people were complaining : « oh, this is not jazz. » but I was also lucky because people who ran this new venue and the previous venue, they just trusted me. I mean, it's pretty rare. I have the same situation in Berlin where I program a venue, and it's the same thing. It's also a dream place, even in terms of the design of the hall, it's ideal because it's round, beautiful – it’s called Pierre Boulez Saal.

Until around 2007, there was nobody from Poland as part of the Europe Jazz network nor at Jazzahead. It's hard to imagine now, but finally Poland has a stand. Before that, there was nothing. Just to give you perspective, when I started traveling because of the festival, nobody knew anything about the Polish jazz scene. They knew Tomasz Stanko, that's it. That was the only name known outside of Poland. When Charles Lloyd decided to write new music for us and released it, that was an important moment because he was changing from ECM to Blue Note. That was a huge push for us because the record was everywhere. While in Japan at that time, I would go to a record store and see big posters of Charles Lloyd/Jazztopad and I was like, « wow ! » It was a breakthrough, people started paying attention, asking Charles Lloyd « What's this festival? Why did you write music for them? ». We slowly got more recognition. 

Ghosted. Photo Joanna Stoga

 
How about documentation ?

PT: We record every concert. We have our archive. Things will come out. Kris Davis is releasing something soon that we recorded here, as well as Nicole Mitchell, James Brandon Lewis…. 


Jakob Bro’s « Fox on Hill » composition was only happening here.  

PT: Only here. I don't remember the last time I got so emotional about music. Maybe it was me, having a lot of things on my mind. The composition was something else and unlike any other concert by Wadada. This situation of him as an interpreter is very rare. I think it was interesting for him to go through that process. He's one of those musicians, every sound he plays, it goes straight to your heart. It's such an honor just to spend time with him. He's a generous, beautiful human being. In 2014 we commissioned him to write for a symphony orchestra, that was the first time we worked together. A huge piece, dedicated to Solidarność, the strike movement in Poland in the eighties, with visuals.
 

It must have spoken to him because he’s concerned about democracy.  

PT: Big time. It's a beautiful thing to be able to work with him, but also, I think because of what we've been doing almost twenty years now, it feels natural. With Jakob Bro, with Charles Lloyd. They've been here before, they know us, they trust us. It's much easier to do something different from that point on. That always was the aim of the festival, to work closely with artists. There are a lot of festivals who are just booking gigs. The bands are on tour, they’ll stop here, play the album, that's it. It's very easy. I can book those in two days if I want to, emailing three agencies, you know, Saudades and so on. Boring. Commissions take a lot of energy but it's a very rewarding process. It's also taking a lot of risks. You don't know what's gonna happen. Likewise when you put musicians together for the first time. For example, the duo with Marta Sanchez and Luke Stewart [from the David Murray Quartet] was a first time. I'm always sure something beautiful is gonna happen, but who knows ? There's a lot about the festival that’s unpredictable, that's what makes it exciting for our audience. From my point of view, it's an extra value to have that because it's not something you can see everywhere.  

Joanna Duda The Great Reset. Photo Joanna Stoga

How did the idea happen to do a leg of the festival in New York? When did it start? 

PT: During the 2013 edition in Wrocław, producer Jason Olaine from Jazz at Lincoln Center visited us. We had a Turkish focus then with a lot of Turkish free jazz musicians, pushing hard, and he loved the festival vibe. He felt good and said « listen, why don't you bring some Polish artists to Dizzy's? » That's how it started. At first, it was a one-day thing. We did it again and it was two days, and then we did it again. I've been coming to New York since 2003 on a regular basis and started connecting with people. We were at The Jazz Standard, Cornelia Street Cafe - those places don't exist anymore. Also National Sawdust, and house concerts as well. But we never wanted to do a government-sponsored Polish festival. From the very beginning when he invited us, I said « I would love to do it, but we need to collaborate. You need to invest money into what we do. Otherwise, it's not gonna happen. I'm not gonna ask the government to pay for everything because then five people will show up and it doesn't make sense, it's gonna be one of those artificial presentations of whatever country's scene because they have money. » The biggest challenge was to find the right partners who are excited about what we do and want to collaborate and pay for it. The Polish Cultural Institute in New York has been supportive. We got a sort of « you can't miss it » label from the New York Times, which was an important moment. The buzz started. We have partners I love working with and are very supportive, but it's more difficult than ever because of the political situation. It’s a kind of a suicidal endeavour when you think about it : « let's bring unknown Polish artist to New York where there's a hundred other concerts with amazing lineups ! » [laughs] This is the city where you have the most things going on at the same time, super competitive. So it's been a journey. Some things didn’t work out with people I thought I could rely upon. Some venues didn't put any work into it. We had concerts where five people showed up, but then, that happens every day in New York. There was a Polish journalist who came to the festival. He hadn't been to New York before, came a few days earlier and started going to gigs. When I met him, he said, « it's incredible, every day is like a festival here. But the clubs are empty. Some places I went to, there was, like, five people. » I replied, « If you didn't have this experience, you would think that we are failing, but that's New York. » Then he saw concerts where we had 300 people and was surprisedall those people came to see Polish artists.In June of 2025, every concert was packed. Even Tuesday evening at Dizzy's, the worst day of the week. They told me, « man, on Tuesdays we really struggle ». It was sold out, two sets. So it takes time, when you're pushing and trying to communicate and encourage people to pay attention. And maybe the audience appreciates that it's a different thing. What’s new in New York? You have everything there every day. Actually not true because we started inviting artists who'd never played there. From Poland, Japan, Australia. We invited Michiyo Yagi, who only was in New York twenty years ago. It would be a dream to present the project with Wadada Leo Smith and Jakob Bro in New York, with the cellos. We need to find people who are interested, willing to put up the money and so on. Every time I have a setback I'm trying to think, I can make this happen. Every year is like a new start. 

Immanuel Wilkins & Lutoslawski String Quartet. Photo Slawek Przerw

Are you doing it again in '26?

PT: Hopefully, yes. It depends on different things : if I can do what I want to do, if our partners will finance it on the level that we need to. We have the dates and are almost ready. But I'm still like, if I stop It doesn't matter, nobody will notice. I mean, it's New York. 2025 was very successful though. Last two, three years I finally felt this made sense. It's a lot of work and when you think about doing this festival here in Wrocław and programming events in Berlin and now also in Banff you kind of lose momentum, but at the same time you get a lot of energy when things happen. 

Concert in Living Room, Piotr Turkiewicz (right). Photo Karol Adam Sokolowski

What would you say is the festival’s ethos?

PT: What's most important is community. We have a community ; I don't know the better word for it right now. Our audience and musicians who come back, that's the strength of the festival. We are supported by people who believe in what we do. It gives us strength to keep on going and pushing. I'm grateful because it's not a given. Community is the artists, audience, reporters, owners of the private apartments, everybody. I've always wanted to create a space for people to feel that we're in it together, that it's not just buying a ticket, seeing a show and going back home. It has to be some kind of experience. Even if it's a bad experience. After Jakob Bro’s Fox on Hill concert, there were extreme ways people felt about it. Some were crying during the piece. Some were just mesmerized. And some were like, « What the hell was it? Wadada could have played more, Jakob didn't play at all. » The piece is what it is, it’s not about the number of notes played. The worst concerts are those where people go out, and they're like, whatever - nothing happened . I love it when they dislike it and I love it when they love it. This is how it should be. Because that means something relevant happened.

Read More

Marco Colonna & Enzo Rocco - Il Fiore Blu (Self-Released, 2026)

By Stef Gijssels

This exceptional duet between Marco Colonna on bass clarinet and Enzo Rocco on guitar was recorded in November 2025 as part of the “Alterazioni” festival in Lainate, Italy, at a wonderful venue that can only add to the quality of the performance. 

The interaction between the two musicians is truly great. Their dialogue—spanning just over half an hour on the opening track—unfolds as an intimate conversation, often moving in a slow parlando, at times lyrical and at others abrasive. Each artist continuously introduces new ideas that are immediately absorbed and reshaped by the other, creating a seamless and endlessly fascinating exchange. There is deep respect and deep listening. 

Despite their formidable technical abilities, virtuosity is never the point; the focus remains firmly on the music itself and the act of co-creation, which ultimately carries far more weight than any display of instrumental prowess. Rocco can unleash crystal clear, rapid-fire runs along the guitar neck, just as Colonna summons multiphonics and timbres so unexpected that one might question whether they truly originate from a bass clarinet (or momentarily from a flute or a fog horn?).

For instrumentalists, there is an abundance to learn here. For everyone else, the reward lies in experiencing the music’s freedom, authenticity, and quiet preciousness. The result is rich and precise, meticulously shaped, and as delicate and intricate as lace, with a musical eclecticism that integrates jazz, blues, classical and folk music and leading us much further into ground-breaking sonic places, yet without ever alienating the listener. 

The sound quality is without any resonance, as if you are sitting next to them, which even more reinforces that feeling of intimacy and proximity. 

The duo released their debut album in 2021, "Nine Improvisations For Sopranino And Guitar"  on the Setola Di Maiale. 

This one is an easy album to recommend. Precious and welcoming. A real treat. 

Listen and download from Bandcamp.

Read More

Sophie Agnel and Mark Sanders - ANTLIA (Shrike Records, 2025)

By Charlie Watkins 

2025 was the year of Sophie Agnel. Whilst recovering from a brain tumour – which also meant starting again with the piano – Agnel managed to release two first-class solo albums (SONG (Relative Pitch) and Learning (OTORUKO)) as well as a brilliant duo with John Butcher (Rare (Les Disques VICTO)), all three of which featured on the Free Jazz Collective’s choices for their albums of 2025 . Just five days after Learning was released in early October, she put out this recording with drummer Mark Sanders: ANTLIA. If I’d heard it sooner, this album would certainly have made it into my top 10.

Antlia is the name of a small and relatively modern constellation that represents an air pump (Antlia is the Greek word for ‘pump’). Its three visible stars are a yellow dwarf, a yellow-white dwarf, and an orange dwarf named Macondo, which are used as the track titles. The choice of a modern constellation for the album title made me consider the act of ‘establishing’ a constellation: by coordinating disparate objects in space, it could be seen as a symbol for what occurs in the act of improvisation. Similarly, the symbol of the air pump, chosen by the French astronomer Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille to represent the Enlightenment, might indicate a parallel between invention and improvisation, such that what is inanimate is brought to life. I can’t help but wonder whether this dark, mysterious music calls into question the rationalism of the Enlightenment in favour of a more ‘magical’ way of thinking (and so perhaps it is also worth noting that ‘Macondo’ is the name of the mythical town in Gabriel García Márquez’s magical realist novel One Hundred Years of Solitude).

The album is brilliantly self-assured; at no point is there any sense of timidity or hesitation. This is particularly impressive considering how the music is constantly in motion, never quite settling in one place. But whilst the music is shifting, there is no denying its cohesion as a whole, characterised both by fragility (which makes the cover image of a dandelion a fitting choice) and a sense of the enigmatic. There are points when Agnel hints towards something more forceful, only for Sanders to refuse her invitation and keep the improvisation in a liminal space (such as towards the end of track three, ‘Orange’). At other times their twisting and turning creates moments of resistance that nonetheless feel completely intuitive (especially on the first track, ‘Antlia’). This dynamic of invitation and refusal generates a momentum not characterised by forward movement as such, but something more like sideways movement – always seeking new directions rather than simply ploughing onwards. It’s immensely satisfying to listen to this interaction take place.

Agnel and Sanders are perfectly matched, particularly because of Agnel’s percussive approach to the piano, bringing all the kinds of sounds you would expect from somebody so influenced by Cage’s prepared piano music. But they’re not afraid to let the silence speak either: at the start of ‘Yellow’, the sounds are suspended in empty space, bell-like in quality. At other points, such as on ‘Yellow-White’, there is a hint of something more metred and continuous. Fittingly, these improvisations all seem to be about letting things happen ‘in space’, drawing them out of the ‘cosmic hum’ of the universe. Throughout the album, the connection between Agnel and Sanders is unbreakable, and this only enhances the feeling that they are establishing their own musical constellation.

It is clear throughout that Agnel and Sanders are kindred musical spirits, and what they create together is the best kind of improvised music: creative, confident and immensely compelling. I have been playing this album for weeks now, and continue to be intrigued by what Agnel and Sanders offer here. I hope we hear much more of this duo in the near future.

ANTLIA is available from Shrike Records on their Bandcamp page:

Read More

Rahsaan Roland Kirk - Vibrations in the Village: Live at the Village Gate / Seek & Listen: Live at the Penthouse (2025, Resonance Records)

By Ferruccio Martinotti

Waiting to see what kind of sonic wind will fill our sails to navigate in the forthcoming 2026’s waters, what’s better than a quick warm up trip towards an old, safe harbor? Coming out: being pretty obsessed with underrated artists, whatever their field, having in our hands, not one but two (!) live recordings of Rahsaan Roland Kirk, the epitome of such beautiful losers, represents a chance hugely immoral to be missed. We all know that this “much loved maverick,” as defined by the Penguin Guide to Jazz, was an astonishing multi-instrumentalist, totally at ease with the whole reeds family, clarinets, harmonica, English horn, trumpet, m’bira and flute, this last played while singing (the “humming” technique, main influence for Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull fame) or with the nose. His deep and ongoing passion for sounds, drove Kirk to play ancient instruments such as the manzello (a soprano with a mellophone bell) and the stritch, a contralto without bell, or to invent brand new sonic devices like the rokon (a sort of whistle), the black mystery pipes (rubber hoses) or the evil box, an electro noise maker. 

Kirk often embraced three saxes together, not to show a bizarre posture but for the sake of a strict, handy necessity due to his blindness since the age of two. This legendary picture, part of the timeless jazz imaginary, has been often used by kritiks (the “k” is not a typo) and musicians to downgrade Kirk as a freakshow, criminally overlooking the amazing sound explorer he was, the timbric balance and the smart eclecticism that allows him to deal with dixie, blues, gospel, soul and funky in a visionary, infectious, furious, passionate but always respectful way. Championed by Charles Mingus until the very last days, revered by Eric Clapton and Frank Zappa, Kirk was for Jimi Hendrix a “stone cold blues musician”, while the black community will never forget when, along with other members of the Jazz and People’s Movement founded in 1970 (Billy Harper, Andrew Cyrille and Lee Morgan), he entered the CBS Studios, showing banners like “More black artists on TV” or “Honor American Jazz Music”, forcing the stop of the Merv Griffin Show that was on air. Fuckin’ ultimate punk gesture, man! 

As a late stop, Santa's sledge, with the license plate Resonance Records, left at our front door two magnificent live gifts by Mr. Kirk. Moving chronologically, the first one, Vibrations in the Village, Live at the Village Gate, was recorded at the New York’s Village Gate on November 26-27, 1963 with pianist Horace Parlan, Melvin Rhyne and Jane Getz, along with bassist Henry Grimes and drummer Sonny Brown. The music, originally recorded for a documentary film, was in storage for the next 62 years until now, when finally restored and mastered from the original tapes by Matthew Lutthans at The Mastering Lab and 9 tracks for an hour of ecstatic pleasure taking no prisoners, driving the listener on a brakeless rollercoaster of blues, ballads, edgy swinging originals and fearless improvisations. Icing on the cake, an extensive booklet with rare photos and liner notes from Jan Persson, Tom Copi, Raymond Ross, John Kruth and May Cobb, plus interviews and testimonials from Jane Getz, James Carter, Chico Freeman, Steve Turre, Adam Dorn (son of long-time Kirk’s producer Joel Dorn) and others. 

With the second, Seek & Listen, Live at the Penthouse, we set the time machine to September 8 and 15, 1967, when Our Man played at the Penthouse jazz club in Seattle accompanied by Rahn Burton on piano, Steve Novosel on bass and Jimmy Hopps on drums. The music, never before released, was originally recorded by radio DJ Jim Wilke for King-FM Radio, then ended up lost somewhere, before being unearthed, restored and mastered, as for the previous record, by Matthew Lutthans. Covers and medleys by Duke Ellington (I’ve got it bad; Sophisticated Lady; Prelude to a kiss; Satin Doll), Burt Bacharach (Alfie), Cole Porter (Every time we say goodbye), Milton Ager (Happy Days are here again) and Bobby Gentry (Ode to Billie Joe) are interspersed with originals, for a joyful, relaxed, even tender journey. Two different live records, two sides of the same coin, the one of a real Maestro: don't miss it. Post Scriptum. A legendary West London post-punk combo formed in 1980, Rip Rig & Panic, took their name after the most famous Kirk’s album, and the sublime Neneh Cherry had the chance to collaborate with them before the band disbanded in 1983. Yes, exactly, dear reader: tout se tient.

Read More

Ensemble Tuvalu - d'une rive à l’autre

The Western Pacific archipelago of Tuvalu—deeply exposed to rising seas and the broader pressures of climate change—has become a symbol of cultural and ecological precarity. This reality inspired bassist Pascal Niggenkemper to create the ensemble Tuvalu, a project that reflects on the human relationship with nature using a melange of musical interludes, sound inventions and spoken texts and poems, which are voiced in the native languages of its performers: French, Flemish, Greek, English, Farsi, German, and Occitan.

The performance captured here in November 2024 at Tollhaus Karlsruhe in Karlsruhe, Germany, unfolds inside a ring of sixteen resonant curtains that enclose the audience, eight musicians, and a poet. At the center, nine “sounding islands” evoke the geography of Tuvalu, while the octet—structured as two near‑twin quartets or four interwoven duos—generates a landscape of hissing, shimmering, humming, and eruptive sound. From this shifting aural and conceptual terrain, colors, patterns, melodies, and improvisations emerge like weather forming over an archipelago.

A recording of the project, containing both a studio recording CD and video of the performance here on DVD can be ordered at subran music on Bandcamp. 

Read More

Paula Sanchez & Katharina Weber - …and discovering fishes that have their own light (Cubus, 2025)

By Richard Blute 

“ Of course! This is the edge of the world! This is the resistance!”

-Fred Frith, from the liner notes

With a lovely, poetic title and euphoric liner notes from guitarist Fred Frith, this album was irresistible. The phrase “fishes that have their own light” fills me with excitement thinking about the mysterious bioluminescent creatures of the deep sea.But it’s the word “discovering” that matters most to me. Improvised music for me is all about discovery, discovering new sounds, new sonic worlds, new ways of communicating. I wanted this music to not just be great, but to match the mood the title stirred in me. Does it succeed? Very much so.

I discovered Katharina Weber through her beautiful piano solo album In Márta’s Garden, based on compositions of György Kurtág. She weaves improvisations with the classical compositions of Kurtág to build something wonderfully new. She frequently lets individual notes linger and their decay becomes as important as the note itself.

Paula Sanchez is an improvising cellist, using various extended techniques including electronics and a prepared cello. Her solo album Sólo Un Pasaje demonstrates the many aspects of her playing. One can hear her classical training, but then the music will veer sharply into something unrecognizable, almost jolting. Beautiful cello notes mix with harsh scrapes and screeches. In her liner notes to Sólo Un Pasaje, she wrote something that applies nicely to both Sólo Un Pasaje and the present album: “I would like to think of sound as a passage, an endless transition. A subterranean murmur of opposite materials fragilely linked to each other, like the places I inhabit.” Beauty and harshness, fragilely linked together, make for a new sonic world to explore.

The album begins with rolling low notes from Weber’s piano matched by Sanchez’s cello which at first feels like it’s exploring this deep ocean universe that Weber is creating. As the music progresses, the cello sounds less and less like classical cello and more its own unique voice. Are we hearing those remarkable creatures of the title? At about the two-minute mark, there is a sharp uptick of intensity and even as the music becomes more and more intense, it is clear that these two musicians are communicating on a profound level, and that remains the case for the entirety of this wonderful album. There are quiet, peaceful places here as well. We hear Weber’s prepared piano at one point and Sanchez vocalizing at another. Every note, every sound is there for a reason, is there with a desire to say something new, something beautiful and maybe a bit eerie, much like the ocean depths of the title. This is improvised music at its very finest. This was one of the very best albums of 2025.

Just as this review began, I’ll end it with the words of the great Fred Frith from the liner notes:

“A play of surfaces, of formal proposals countermanded by a deep impulse to question, to challenge, to undermine. Every echo, every pulsating breath, every breaking away into distant reveries, all of its exquisite tension capturing the ear and the heart and holding them fast.” 

Read More

Joanna Duda - Delighted (Byrd Out, 2025)

By Paul Acquaro

 

Polish pianist Joanna Duda has a lithe, modern approach to the piano. Clear and repetitive figures interlock in hypnotic patterns, and although often precise and stark, her music can also be dramatic and laden with emotion. It is an alluring combination and one that can crack the scar tissue of the hardened experimental listener with incisive melodies and quick atonal jabs.

 

On Delighted, which is Duda's second release with her trio, bassist Jort Terwijn and drummer Michał Bryndal provide support with both their respective instruments as well as contribute to the electronics that Dude laces throughout her compositions. To describe the result, the cliché "tapestry" fits quite well: the music weaves melodic patterns, electronic adornments and solid threads of rhythm seamlessly together.

 

Delighted begins with the track 'We're New to This Planet', a simple chord sequence from Duda starts things off, while Terwijn provides a forward moving melody on the bass. Light drumming fills in the backing layer and it indeed feels like the first day of a fresh start on a new planet. Then, the wake up call comes: a slight hesitation followed by rhythmic syncopation from everyone. It's jolting and introduces the expansion of atonal melodic snippets and poly-rhythmic passages, leading to a modicum of free-improvisation before settling into a soothing ending.

 

Later tracks expand on all the elements found in the first track. In the following 'Those Who Think They're French but are Actually Russians,' a lilting melody with classical tendencies juxtaposes with uptempo arrhythmic swing. 'When the Truffles Get Dry' starts with an aggressively propulsive riff that leads deep into vintage Bad Plus musical territory and features some ping-ponging rhythmic moments. Among the other tracks left to discover, 'Romantische Sache' demonstrates the most robust application of electronics on the recording. Following its open-hearted intro, the middle half of the song spirals into bits and bytes before eventually reconstituting itself.

 

While Delighted leans towards the more melodic and composed, subversive elements draws it gently in an experimental direction. Certainly worth an open-eared listen. 

Read More

More music by Rob Mazurek

 By Stef Gijssels

The last two years were quite prolific for Chicagoan trumpeter and visual artist, with "Milan", "C6Fe2RN6", "Nestor’s Nest" and Exploding Star Orchestra's "Live at the Adler Planetarium".

Here are a few more noteworthy albums by Mazurek and his collaborators. Back in 2011, I described him as a kind of musical genius, and it’s clear that he has continued to grow into that promise. His music is unmistakably his own, yet deeply informed by a wide range of styles and genres. It forms an eclectic constellation of sonic ideas—carefully arranged, post-produced, dubbed, and electronically enhanced—that nonetheless retains a coherent, authentic, almost pure and honest voice. Without yielding to trends or fashions, Mazurek persistently searches for new modes of expression, creating music that is often unexpectedly beautiful and, at times, ventures beyond beauty into more challenging sonic territories that demand especially open ears. But that, after all, is the privilege of true artists: to open new doors and invite listeners into unfamiliar and rewarding listening experiences. And all credit to him for reinventing himself in the process. 

He is also a visual artist and three of the covers below are by his hand. 

Chicago Underground Duo - Hyperglyph (International Anthem, 2025)

The Chicago Underground is an ensemble that has been a trio, quartet and quintet format, yet the duo format of Mazurek and Chad Taylor is the core of their musical concept, a collaboration that harks back to 1988, when Taylor was only fifteen. Chad Taylor plays drums, percussion, mbira and kalimba, while Mazurek plays trumpet, piccolo trumpet, RMI electric piano, modular synths, samplers, voice, flutes and bells. And as you can imagine these instruments lead to many layers of sound in the editing room, making them sound like a full band. 

The music is ultra-processed, with compositions that vary between fun and joyful to mournful and melancholy, integrating many, many influences from jazz, rock, world music and noise. The pièce-de-résistance is the three part "Egyptian Suite". Rhythmic inventiveness and great themes are usually the core of each track, with the electronics and synths and overdubs adding to the density of the sound while keeping things still light and shining. It's hard to describe. It's accessible and not, it's magical and recognisable, it's mysterious and familiar. 

I can also refer to the very lengthy liner notes on the Bandcamp page which give a really good description of the album. Yet I just recommend you listen to the music. 

Listen and download from Bandcamp. 

Exploding Star Orchestra - Holy Mountains (Selo Sesc, 2025) 

Of all the large free jazz bands that we like (Fire! Orchestra, Angles, Pål Nilssen-Love's Large Unit, Barry Guy's Blue Shroud Band, ...), the Exploding Star Orchestra is one of my favourites. The wonderful themes and the organised chaos of the arrangements, and the brilliant combination of deeply rooted infectious rhythms combined with the mysteries of advanced astronomy and space exploration. 

The orchestra are 

• Rob Mazurek on trumpet, horn, percussion, musical direction
• Chad Taylor on drums 
• Damon Locks on voice, electronics 
• Guilherme Granado on sampler, keyboards, percussion 
• James Brandon Lewis on tenor saxophone 
• Luke Stewart on double bass 
• Mikel Patrick Avery on electronic drums 
• Pasquale Mirra on vibraphone 
• Philip Somervell on piano 
• Rodrigo Brandão on voice   
• Thomas Rohrer on rabeca and soprano saxophone

The performance was recorded in October 2022 at Sesc Pompeia, in São Paulo, Brasil and the addition of the Brazilian musician is great, including the poetry recitation in Portuguese by Rodrigo Brandão, even if I don't understand a word of it, except for 'Orquestra da Estrella Vermilha' or Red Star Orchestra. Damon Locks is also present, reciting the space poetry of Mazurek. 

The album includes a tune we know: "Parable 3000 (We All Come From Somewhere Else)" from "Dimensional Stardust" and "Live At The Adler Planetarium". Next to the 'parables', there's a sequence of three 'Spirit Flares', of which Part 2 is absolutely astonishing. with James Brandon Lewis in a lead role, as he also does on other pieces. 

Mazurek comments: "I play the role of conductor, director, composer, all these things. The group is a vehicle for imagination. I implicitly trust musicians in everything. I say 'do some of the things I do, but not all of them. You can make your own decisions, of course.' They are all masters of improvisation and creative musicians, so I don't need to say much. You also bring your culture to music. As much freedom as possible". 

And that's how it sounds: the identifiable musical voice of the composer in a brilliant mix of cultural influences, other voices, new artistic ideas and collective improvisation, leading to weird and mysterious moments, alternated by a trance-inducing rhythmic roller-coaster.

Enjoy!

Listen to the music via the label. 

Rob Mazurek Quartet - Color Systems (RogueArt, 2024)

The Rob Mazurek Quartet are Rob Mazurek on trumpet, piccolo trumpet, bells, electronics, Angelica Sanchez on piano, Tomeka Reid on cello, and Chad Taylor on drums: a super-band, all musicians with whom Mazurek has a long collaboration, including with the Exploding Star Orchestra. 

For Mazurek, 'synesthesia', or the neurological interference of sonic and visual perceptions is an important artistic experience and tool. In "Color Systems", he not only brings tribute to a number of visual artists - Louise Nevelson, Frank Bowling, Lygia Pape, Richard Tuttle, Nuno Ramos, Ellsworth Kelly - but he uses their art to inspire or even to translate the visual impressions into sound. For the first four tracks, Mazurek offered four of his own watercolour and ink pages to each musician as inspiration for the otherwise fully improvised pieces. The quality of the band is such that they bring it to an excellent result, with especially Mazurek himself and Chad Taylor in excellent shape. For once, Mazurek's trumpet plays a key role in the music, much more than in his large ensemble or electronic endeavours. The role of the piano and the cello are more subtle, and absolutely essential for the colouring that is taking place. 

The final two tracks are fully composed, giving Sanchez and Reid more formal roles. As with much of Mazurek’s work, the pieces unfold as patchworks of contrasting fragments and musical ideas, carefully juxtaposed and woven together. Distinct concepts and tonal colours flow seamlessly into one another in an organic, almost intuitive way—much like the shifting hues in a visual artist’s installation. It’s difficult to capture in words without hearing the music itself, but I trust you’ll sense what I mean.

The album is further accompanied by a book with paintings and poems by Mazurek, called "Flitting Splits Reverb Adage", a title we know from a composition with Damon Lock. I do not have a copy of the book, but John Corbett describes it as follows: "Conjuring a cosmic sonosphere, the sound-crust on the canvas of our shared existence, Mazurek evokes more in a few lines than many writers do in volumes".

Listen and download from Bandcamp. 

Alberto Novello & Rob Mazurek - Sun Eaters (Hive Mind, 2025)

Alberto Novello is an Italian digital audiovisual artist who also works under the alias Jestern. His bio notes that he "graduated in Nuclear Physics at the University of Trieste, completed the master Art Science Technologies with Jean Claude Risset, obtained a PhD degree at the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven with Armin Kohlrausch, and graduated in Electronic Music at the Institute of Sonology, Royal Conservatory of Den Haag. He worked for Texas Instruments, Philips Research, and Auro Technologies creating software for their audio applications." So not really the kind of profile you would expect on this blog. On this album he plays modular synth, while Rob Mazurek plays trumpets, sampler and bells. 

I'm in two minds about the music itself. At times it's fresh, inventive, interesting or even fascinating, at other times it's both annoying and irritating, but that may be due to my aversion of electronics, which is often reducing sounds to mere bips, bleeps, chirps, pings, beeps, pips, dings or boops. It's an acquired taste and one that Mazurek himself uses increasingly, and that's of course part of artistic risk-taking: you have to go outside the beaten track. Think of Don Cherry's "Human Music" album with Jon Appleton. Some people love it, and appreciate its forward-looking and boundary-breaking nature. I'm still not one of them. But I don't want to be too negative. This album really has its great moments. Especially the strange and intense "Ricochet Edge Verse" uses electronics at their best, full of variation, power, surprises in close interplay with the trumpet, the dark "Luchadores Sudden Embrace", or the slow "Automaton Phase 27", a quietly developing piece with mysterious sounds providing the backdrop of Mazurek's brilliant trumpet playing. 

You judge.

Listen and download from Bandcamp. 

Star Splitter - Medea (We Insist!, 2024)

Star Splitter is the duo of Gabriele Mitelli on cornet, trumpet, voice and electronics, and 
Rob Mazurek on piccolo trumpet, trumpet, voice and electronics. They present two long pieces, each around 19 minutes, both of them compelling sonic journeys. Electronics, percussive textures, and soaring—often electronically altered—trumpets intertwine, punctuated by occasional shouts. The music is mysterious, bizarre, and excellent. Not until about five minutes into the first track does the trumpet make its initial appearance, underscoring the duo’s focus on overall sound rather than on the instruments themselves. Moments of striking beauty alternate with sounds that are completely “out there.”

The "Medea" in the title possibly refers to the ancient Greek mythology. Medea was a sorceress, with magic powers. She killed her brother and married Jason, then after ten years Jason kicked her out, and out of spite, she killed their sons and Jason's new bride. Enough story to reflect on. The tension and the sense of love and tragedy and horror and magic - it's all here. 

Listen and download from Bandcamp. 

Read More

Lucian Ban, John Surman and Mat Maneri

Lucian Ban, John Surman, Mat Maneri – Cantica Profana (Sunnyside, 2025)

Lucian Ban, John Surman, Mat Maneri – The Athenaeum Concert (Sunnyside, 2025)

By Dan Sorrells 

The folk music that so inspired Béla Bartók as he traveled Transylvania with his phonograph one hundred years ago continues to bloom, renewing in cycles, the flowers and forms of one season becoming the fertile humus that grows the next generation. In 2020, the trio of pianist Lucian Ban, violist Mat Maneri, and woodwind maestro John Surman debuted their chamber-folk improvisations on Transylvanian Folk Songs,a project rooted deeply in Bartók's own and an outgrowth of Ban and Maneri's earlier duo work. After some pandemic delays, the trio toured on the material between 2022 and 2024. From those concerts, two new releases on Sunnyside: Cantica Profana, a compilation of tracks from several European shows, and The Athenaeum Concert, a full set from the prestigious Romanian Athenaeum in Bucharest (which would also turn out to be Surman's last major performance before his retirement).

Transylvanian Folk Songs originally featured nine tracks inspired by transcriptions and wax cylinder recordings Bartók made of traditional peasant tunes from the Carpathians. This is music that also imbued Ban's childhood in Cluj. Like the nine sons in Bartók's "Cantata Profana," these songs underwent a profound metamorphosis at the hands of the trio, budding melodies and motifs charged with an improvised magic that transformed them into something wilder and less familiar. Cantica Profana and The Athenaeum Concert further push this evolution, with the opportunity to hear multiple versions of songs showing how the trio continually reshapes and renews its source material.

The more upbeat pieces—"Violin Song," "Dowry Song," "Transylvanian Dance"—are driven by rhythmic motives, often delivered by Ban but liable to be traded around to any member as the moment demands. This rhythm helps structure the improvisations and allows the trio to range farther from the folk aspects of the primary melodies. These are the tracks, such as the long Athenaeum take of "Dowry Song," that can verge closest to jazz—only in brief flashes—flirting momentarily with a bluesy chord progression or syncopated figure, able to snap back at the call of the motif. But while these musicians with deep jazz credentials are creating music that isn't overtly jazzy, they bring some of its newer tools to bear on an older realm of music that was rooted in improvisation. "Carol" from Transylvanian Folk Songs develops a beautiful, rippling quality like light on water; it resurfaces in a knottier form on Cantica Profana as "Dark Woods," night music possessing the character of its new name. Ban's elegiac but resolute piano from "Bitter Love Song" becomes muted and percussive in its reimagining as "Evening in the Village," where Suman's bass clarinet and Maneri's viola are a rich embroidery of sound, stitched in braided patterns. Some songs touch only lightly upon their founding melodies, inaugural seeds that warmly house the essence and energy for the trio's new growth.

The music across these albums is held in a series of tensions: it contains that kernel of its originary material, but at the same time can feel distant from the vocal tradition that inspired it. It doesn't sound like something that would be sung in the village square, but it can also sound radical in the context of the concert halls and churches it was performed in. Too well-dressed to be free improvisation, too tousled for classical music. Maneri and Surman both work around the harmonic edges, straying into microtonal realms that are a natural component of many folk musics but can give an alien sheen to chamber music. Ban is a pianist of beautiful clarity, but he can also be slyly non-linear, even his comping at times subverting tidy resolution, like his staccato pressure building in "Violin Song II."

There's a risk, as this music resounds within the frescoed dome of the Athenaeum, that it becomes divorced from that provincial spirit that originally shaped it. This concerned Bartók, too. Alex Ross noted that he "acknowledged the gap between what urban listeners considered folkish […] and what peasants were actually singing and playing." Ban quotes Bartók directly in the liner notes, where he claims that the "harsh characters" of musical notation "cannot possibly render […] all the pulsing life of peasant-music." But Cantica Profanaand The Athenaeum Concert are not ethnographic or nostalgic exercises; the goal is not imitation or resurrection. The trio stand near a familiar old starting point and set off a different way, where the path isn't so well-defined—or is waiting to be cut. There’s often something haunting in the result, perhaps conjured in the resonance of these concert spaces, where the trio becomes a medium for something quite ghostly, tuned into an ancient and fragmented signal, orphic melodies fleetingly brought into focus, glimpses through the thickets.

As these ethereal melodies surface in the developing improvisations—just listen to the yearning when the theme finally emerges in "First Return" and "Last Return"—I find myself marveling: how does this music, abstracted so many steps from its source, so strongly retain its vital character? The trio never neglects its emotional core. Improvisation becomes the engine of that timeless emotive content. That pulsing life. It's a most difficult thing: to catch hold of those deep-rooted musical qualities that feel universal and then make them sound like something we haven't heard before.

Read More

Jon Raskin and Jon Bafus - Ultimately, It's Everything (BLALKED, 2026)

By Hrayr Attarian

Saxophonist Jon Raskin is a restlessly innovative artist. From his work with the Rova Saxophone Quartet to his graphical scores, Raskin has built a uniquely brilliant body of work. Fellow Sacramento native, percussionist Jon Bafus, also has an idiosyncratic style that perfectly complements Raskin’s. Ultimately, It's Everything, the pair’s second duo release, consists of eight vibrant, abstract pieces that brim with spontaneity.

On “Small Events,” Bafus’ sparse beats and Raskin’s brief cluster of notes build a mystical atmosphere. Raskin plays haunting melodic fragments while Bafus adds evocative chimes and clattering sounds, creating an ethereal soundscape. The ebb and flow of crystalline rhythms and angular lines results in delightful tension.

The cinematic “Ants” that follows features Raskin’s soulful growling baritone saxophone, weaving a bluesy melody over Bafus’ swaggering cadence. The warm, passionate duet is at once provocative and mellifluous. Hints of eastern influences pepper the improvisation before it embraces thrilling dissonance with controlled abandon. This seamless transition is a natural evolution of the music, resulting in a thematically unified, captivating tune.

Elsewhere, “Gravel Path” is equally vivid, with Bafus’ percolating polyrhythms providing an energetic backdrop for Raskin’s lyrical musings. The simmering conversation builds momentum into an absorbing, complex poetic dialogue. The repeating motifs change with each refrain, maintaining a cohesiveness yet remaining refreshingly inventive.

The somber “Aggregte Brush” starts with a pastoral ambience. Bafus makes his instruments darkly rustle and rumble while Raskin weaves a haunting extemporization on his sopranino saxophone. He then lets loose an eloquent solo, a mix of plaintive tones and fiery phrases, while Bafus’s muscular percussion endows the track with a primal spirituality. This incandescent, dynamic performance makes an apt conclusion to this stimulating album.

With Bafus’ elegant artwork gracing its cover, Ultimately, It's Everything is a fascinating and poignant recording that engrosses from the very first bar to the last. It is a perfect example of synergistic creativity and ingenuity. It is a major highlight in Raskin’s and Bafus’ uniformly superb discography.

Read More