PRESS INFO
JAZZTOPAD FESTIVAL AND THE POLISH CULTURAL INSTITUTE NEW YORK
present
JAZZTOPAD FESTIVAL PRESENTS: THE BEST OF POLISH JAZZ
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21, 2017 - THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 2017
DIZZY’S CLUB COCA-COLA, NATIONAL SAWDUST, JOE’S PUB, THE JAZZ GALLERY, MILLENNIUM STAGE, TD VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL JAZZ FESTIVAL, TD VICTORIA INTERNATIONAL JAZZ FESTIVAL
“The Jazztopad Festival, a leading event of its kind in Poland…”– Nate Chinen, The New York Times
“…top flight musicians will celebrate improvisation on stage in the homeland of Jazz, the United States…" – Bonnie Johnson, WICN “Colors of Jazz”
“The Jazztopad Festival brings together the jazz movement that is happening in Europe to the USA…” – Tim Longo, Sneek City
“…Jazztopad stands as an internationally renowned festival with a clearly defined ethos, one that combines a strong respect for the traditions and roots of the music with a progressive vision that provides a platform for the contemporary and innovative.” – Ian Patterson, All About Jazz
For the third time, a special edition of Wroclaw’s Jazztopad Festival will be held in the United States and Canada, in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute New York and with support from the Adam Mickiewicz Institute. This June, leading Polish jazz and contemporary music ensembles and artists Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet, Stryjo, Marcin Masecki, Jerzy Rogiewicz, and the Lutoslawski Quartet will perform in New York, Washington DC, and Vancouver. Distinguished artists from previous editions of Jazztopad, including Erik Friedlander, Mark Feldman and Sylvie Courvoisier, will join the Polish musicians. Artists from Poland will play at the prestigious Jazz at Lincoln Center, at The Jazz Gallery, eclectic Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater, Millennium Stage at the Kennedy Center, and at the popular TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival. Mark Feldman and Sylvie Courvoisier will join the Polish musicians at the National Sawdust. Erik Friedlander will join forces with the Polish performers at The Jazz Gallery.
Jazztopad Festival, the leading event of its kind in Poland, has organized its satellite editions all over the world (Japan, Turkey, South Korea). For over ten years, the festival has been commissioning music from some of the most important American artists including Wayne Shorter, Charles Lloyd, Jason Moran, William Parker, Vijay Iyer and Terence Blanchard. The international creative partnerships of Jazztopad include such prestigious organizations as Jazz at Lincoln Center, Monterey Jazz Festival, Kennedy Center, London Jazz Festival and LA Philharmonic. Live recordings from the festival have been released on ECM and Blue Note Records.
The American edition of Jazztopad Festival will be above all an opportunity to discover the most important artists from the Polish contemporary jazz scene which has been a strongly recognizable brand in the world, both in terms of quality of festivals and the craft of artists. It will be also an occasion to hear music that has never been performed outside of Poland including premiere of Mark Feldman’s piece commissioned by Jazztopad.
The American edition of the Jazztopad Festival is presented by the National Forum of Music, the Polish Cultural Institute New York, in collaboration with Jazz at Lincoln Center, National Sawdust, The Jazz Gallery, Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater, Millennium Stage at the Kennedy Center, TD Victoria Jazz Festival and TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival.
Co-Partners: The Adam Mickiewicz Institute / Culture.pl, Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Washington, D.C.
Schedule
Jazztopad Festival Presents: The Best of Polish Jazz Wednesday, June 21, 2017 - Thursday, June 29, 2017
USA
Wednesday, 21 June 2017, 6:00 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Marcin Masecki feat. Jerzy Rogiewicz: Ragtime Kennedy Center - Millennium Stage 2700 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20566
Wednesday, 21 June 2017, 7:30 and 9:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Stryjo, Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola / Jazz at Lincoln Center 10 Columbus Circle, 5th Floor New York, NY 10019
Thursday, 22 June 2017, 7:30 and 9:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Stryjo, Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola / Jazz at Lincoln Center 10 Columbus Circle, 5th Floor New York, NY 10019
Friday, 23 June 2017, 7:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Marcin Masecki feat. Jerzy Rogiewicz: Ragtime Joe’s Pub at The Public The Public Theater 425 Lafayette Street (at Astor Place) New York, NY 10003
Saturday, 24 June 2017, 07:30 and 09:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet with Erik Friedlander The Jazz Gallery 1160 Broadway, 5th Floor New York, NY 10001
Sunday, June 25 2017, 4:00 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Lutoslawski Quartet with Mark Feldman & Sylvie Courvoisier National Sawdust 80 N 6th St. Brooklyn, NY 11249
CANADA
Wednesday, 28 June 2017, 8:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet TD Victoria International Jazz Festival 345 Quebec Street, Victoria, BC V8V 1W4
Thursday, 29 June 2017, 2:30 pm Jazztopad Festival Presents: Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival 295 W 7th Ave, Vancouver, BC V5Y 1L9
More about the artists
Wójcinski/Szmanda Quartet formed in 2015 (Szymon Wojcinski – piano, Maurycy Wojcinski – trumpet, Ksawery Wojcinski – double bass, Krzysztof Szmanda – drums) and immediately caught the attention of jazz fans. The idea of the quartet came from the three Wójcinski brothers: after years of independent activities in various line-ups they decided to create a new band and invited the esteemed drummer Krzysztof Szmanda to join. Their compositions rely on “an effortless, remarkably peaceful development of a theme, which then evolves into a parade of improvisation, but one that is still within the frames of composition, making the listener fall into a kind of trance.”
Ksawery Wojcinski is a double bassist, composer, and a versatile musician with a great sensitivity to sound. His interests span from early music to contemporary improvisation. His collaborators include Charles Gayle, Uri Caine, Michael Zerang, Satoko Fujii, Nicole Mitchell, Tim Sparks, Ken Vandermark, Mats Gustafsson and Waclaw Zimpel. He is a member of several bands, has made a dozen recordings and performed at prestigious festivals in Poland and internationally. 2014 saw the release of his solo album The Soul. Krzysztof Szmanda graduated from the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw. Later, he continued his postgraduate studies at the USC Thornton School of Music in Los Angeles, where he mastered his skills with Peter Erskine, Leon “Ndugu” Chancler and Erik Forrester. He is the founder of the Poznan-based group Soundcheck, winner of numerous awards, including the International Jazz and Blues competition in Usti nad Labem (Czech Republic), and the Grand Prix at the Jazz on the Odra Festival in Wroclaw. Szymon Wojcinski is a pianist, composer, and arranger with a wide stylistic interest, from classical, through jazz, to contemporary improvised music. He reached the final of Jazz Juniors Festival in 2002 with the band Emergency. He has toured with Sylwia Bialas and Hans Peter Salentin with the European Jazz Ensemble. Maurycy Wojcinski is a jazz trumpeter, graduate of the Karol Lipinski Academy of Music in Wroclaw, where he is also a faculty member. He has collaborated with major Polish and international bands and performed with leading Polish and Japanese artists, among others. He is a winner of numerous Polish and international awards and competitions.
Stryjo (Nikola Kolodziejczyk – piano, Maciej Szczycinski – double bass, Michal Bryndal – drums) breaks the scheme of a jazz trio and employs democracy and interaction in place of leadership and competition. After touring with original compositions, they gradually started to improvise whole concerts, inventing compositions as they went. When improvising, they go beyond the typical building blocks of a trio idiom with a linear storytelling. It is modern European jazz, referring to the roots of classical music, drawing inspiration from Polish folk music, flamenco, disco, punk, IDM and World Music. They have gathered critical acclaim and won several Polish music awards, including the Fryderyk award – a Polish counterpart to the American Grammy.
Marcin Masecki is joined by drummer Jerzy Rogiewicz in a program of classic Ragtimes and stride- piano hits. The music of James P. Johnson, Fats Waller and Eubie Blake is presented along with their Polish counterparts Henryk Wars and Jerzy Petersburski. Ragtime is one of Masecki’s many facets. This year he released his fifth album of classical music (Chopin Nocturnes), he leads several bands of different sizes and genres (the jazz sextet Profesjonalizm, the brass band Polonezy), he performs as soloist with classical orchestras (Arte dei Suonatori, Capella Cracoviensis, Poznan Philharmonia) and works with a great variety of musicians in improvised concerts (Ziv Ravitz, Barry Guy, Tomasz Stanko). He is also a curator of musical events, including last summer’s Transkrypcje Festival in Warsaw, focusing on modern transcriptions of Beethoven’s Symphonies. Masecki is regularly invited to festivals and ensembles as a composer. Recently, his new piece for choir and big band, “We Are Crying,” was premiered at Wroclaw’s Jazztopad Festival. In all his projects, Masecki elegantly fuses the different styles he works in, blurring the line between so-called high art and entertainment. Since 2010 he was been working closely with Jerzy Rogiewicz, drummer, pianist and composer. Their last collaboration was a production of Gorecki’s recently discovered oratorio Sanctus Adalbertus. Jerzy Rogiewicz has collaborated with Masecki since 2010 (in the bands Profesjonalizm, Warszawska Orkiestra Rozrywkowa, Polonezy, and V/TLD trio with DJ Lenar). He is also a member of the rock group Der Father, with whom he recorded the album Wake Up (Lado ABC, 2014). Additionally, from 2005-2012 he was a member of Levity, an instrumental trio considered one of the most important modern jazz ensembles in Poland. His Muzyka poważna (Serious Music) for 11-strong orchestra premiered in 2013. In 2015, he performed his Muzyka na Wodzie (Water Music) on Lake Hołny in Krasnogruda, with young artists from the Sejny Jazz Cooperative. Rogiewicz is also an author of film music and music for children (created with the Jerz Igor duo). He has played with such outstanding musicians as Toshinori Kondo, David Thomas, Ray Dickaty, and Wojtek Traczyk.
A resident ensemble of the National Forum of Music (Wroclaw, Poland), the Lutoslawski Quartet has been going from strength to strength for ten years. They began their anniversary year with a nomination for a BBC Music Magazine Award. They have performed at numerous prestigious festivals, such as the Klara Festival in Brussels and the Ankara Music Festival in Turkey. Their collaborators include outstanding jazz artists Kenny Wheeler, John Taylor, and Uri Caine. With Krzysztof Jakowicz and Andrzej Bauer they recorded their first CD with chamber music by Witold Lutoslawski (CD Accord). Their main specialty is 20th century music, with an emphasis on promoting Polish music. Their repertoire includes Classical and Romantic works as well as jazz.
Cellist Erik Friedlander is a composer, improviser, and a veteran of NYC’s Downtown scene. He has backed John Zorn, Laurie Anderson and Courtney Love. He has recorded eight CDs as a leader and has always worked to stake out new ground for the cello in both his compositional choices and his dynamic improvising style.
Sylvie Courvoisier is a pianist, composer, sideman and band leader. Born in Lausanne, Switzerland, Courvoisier moved to New York in 1998 and has lived in Brooklyn since that time. She has led several groups over the years and has recorded over 60 records for different labels, notably ECM, Tzadik and Intakt Records. Courvoisier has performed and recorded with John Zorn, Mark Feldman, Yusef Lateef, Ikue Mori, Erik Friedlander, Herb Robertson, Tim Berne, Susie Ibarra, Joelle Leandre among others. Since 1997, she performs regularly in solo and in Duo with Mark Feldman. She is a member of Mephista, co-leads the Courvoisier/ Feldman Quartet, is the leader of the Trio with Kenny Wollesen and Drew Gress, and her quintet "Lonelyville." Since 2010, she has been working as a pianist and composer with the flamenco dancer Israel Galvan on their project "la Curva." Awards include Switzerland's 1996 Prix des Jeunes Créateurs, Zonta Club's 2000 Prix de la Création, and Switzerland's 2010 Grand Prix de la Fondation Vaudoise de la Culture, and 2013 NYFA Award (New York Foundation for the Arts).
Mark Feldman is a violinist and active performer in the worlds of Jazz, Improvised Music and 20th Century Contemporary Music. He has been awarded the Alpert Prize in Music and a Grammy. He is found on over 150 jazz and creative music recordings as a soloist, including his own releases. He has toured and recorded extensively with John Zorn, John Abercrombie, Cheryl Crow, The Manhattan Transfer, Diana Ross, Carol King, Dave Douglas, Placido Domingo, Chris Potter, Paul Bley, Muhul Richard Abrams, Joe Lovano, Billy Hart, and Uri Caine and has been commissioned and performed by the Kronos Quartet and the WDR Radio Orchestra. As a studio musician he appeared on over 200 Recordings including albums by Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson and George Jones, Jerry Lee Lewis and Television evangelist Jimmy Swaggart. He often performs in Duo with his partner, pianist Sylvie Courvoisier and in a new quartet with Scott Colley, bass and Billy Mintz on drums.