DIONYSIAN ERUPTION OF BALKAN MUSICAL MIGHT
A journal of the 7 Bulgarian Jazz Days in Vienna
Christoph Huber, proprietor of the prestigious Viennese jazz club PORGY AND BESS, Vladimir Vladigerov, and the Bulgarian Ambassador of Austria - her Excellency Elena Kirtcheva, gathered 22 Bulgarians, 7 Austrians, and mixed them for a 7 days festival (January 7-13) called STEP ACROSS THE BORDER: BULGARIA. This endeavor turned out to be one of the mightiest, and truly FESTIVE music events I have ever attended. On JANUARY 4th I boarded an Austrian Airline Boeing, and after nearly 20 hours of avio tortures landed in the city of Beethoven, Mozart, and Dr. Freud. I was given an apartment in the HOUSE OF WITTGENSTEIN - an architectural marvel harboring the BULGARIAN CULTURAL CENTER IN VIENNA. There was something very peculiar about my apartment: its bathroom was bigger than the bedroom. On top of that it seemed that during my stay I had a couple of visits by Mr. Wittgenstein's ghost. In the morning after the second night I was awakened by a loud, crashing noise. I got up, walked in the living room where the huge light fixture from the ceiling was down the floor, shattered into hundreds of tiny pieces of glass! Two days later the apartment's door (while unlocking it from outside) came out of its hinges and started flying inside! I grabbed it just before it would brake the big mirror hanging on the opposite wall of the entry room. Bobby, the house keeper said that he has never had such things happening since he took the job 15 years ago. This fact made my stay even more special.
JANUARY 6th. Rehearsing the quintet for the 2nd set of opening night: Ventzy Blagoev (tp) Georgi Kornazov (tb) Vesselin Vesselinov-Eko (b), Hristo Yotzov (dr) and yours truly on the piano. The piano happened to be a beautiful 9 footer Boesendorfer. I have played previously with all the guys except Georgi Kornazov. After Ivo Papazov, Theodossii Spassov, Vicky Almazidu, and Darinka Tzekova (the incredible gadulka player) Georgi was the next marvelous Bulgarian discovery for me. He lives and works in Paris where he often crosses paths with Glenn Ferris - another great trombonist from the Don Ellis Orchestra. I rehearsed a program consisting entirely of my originals. Georgi played like he wrote them! On the 8th (the second Festival day) he amazed me even more leading also a quintet playing his compositions. But later for that.
JANUARY 7th, 8:00 PM, FIRST SET I am slightly nervous; I have to open the festival with a solo piano set. Playing solo has always been the most difficult music task for me. There is no tossing of ideas. All the ideas has to come from me. It's like music masturbation. My forte is in ensemble playing. Despite this the set went pretty good. In the middle I played one standard, “Lush Life". Ended the set with the inevitable “Bulgarian Boogie". This number, and Gershwin's “Rhapsody In Blue are two pieces I have played hundreds of times. It's a real challenge to make them fresh each time. SECOND SET. The QUINTET playing was a pure joy. The ending number “Women's Dance" got the audience on their feet.
As a SPECIAL FEATURE, at 12:00 midnight the DRUMBOY DUO - Stoyan Yankoulov (drums, percussion, tupan, drumboy) and Elitsa Todorova (vocals, percussion) presented a Bulgarian Ethnic-Jazz set. (The “Drumboy" is the Bulgarian equivalent of the Jew's Harp). Yankoulov is one of the most original percussionists coming from the Balkans. He plays a mean trap drums as well. Elitsa sings straight, no vibrato at all (my favorite type of singing) which is, as every musician knows, the most difficult vocal thing (sorry, opera buffs). This duois a real music tandem; they sound like Siamese twins (or -- like Rimsky and Korssakov, as a music critic once said) The audience sensed this and awarded them with tremendous applause.
JANUARY 8, FIRST SET. Simeon Sterev (fl) and Mario Stanchev(p) Duo. I have known Simeon “Banana"Sterev since the late fifties. In the mid 60ties he, Liuben “the Camel"Borissov(b), Pepi Slavov(dr), and I formed the JAZZ FOCUS 65 Quartet which won the special Critics Prize at the first Montreaux Jazz Festival in 1967. Banana is one of the world's greatest jazz flutist. I knew of Mario Stanchev (he has been living for quite long time in Lion, France) through his father, also a pianist, but I was not acquainted with his musicianship. I've been hearing only good things about his playing -- and it turned out to be more than just “good". Mario is definitely a member of the Tasteful Jazz Musicians League, as a pianist, and composer. He plays with finesse, and French “panache". This made a good contrast later, in the quintet formation, against the powerful and exuberant Georgi Kornazov.
SECOND SET. GEORGI KORNAZOV QUINTET: Georgi (tb) Ventzy (tp) Mario (p) Georg Breinschmid (b) and Christian Salfellner (dr) -- both from Austria. I think this was the highlight of the festival. Georgi's compositions and playing are charged with the highest Dionysius-Orpheus kind of stuff. There is something very primitive combined with high sophistication in his music making -- the kind of Art appealing the most to me.
At midnight a DUO consisting of Vladimir Vladigerov and myself played a set called “Violin and Jazz" as a SPECIAL Feature # 2. That was Vladimir's idea - to present violin music influenced by the jazz idiom. To my knowledge this presentation was the first of its kind. We played arrangements on Scott Joplin by Izhak Perlman, and originals by Kreisler, Misha Elman, Gershwin and myself. Vladimir definitely has the Vladigerov genial musical blood.
JANUARY 9. FIRST SET. YILDIZ IBRAHIMOVA QUARTET: Yildiz (vocal) Antony Donchev (p) Vesselin Vesselinov-Eco (b) and Hristo Yotzov (dr) I've known Yildiz since the early 80ties. We played together in numerous occasions. She is a singer possessing high intelligence, frightening vocal technique, and an impressive stage presence. She made the audience crazy! (By the way, all nights were packed to full capacity with music lovers. “Porgy" seats nearly 500 people!) The only criticism I have about Yildiz's work: I wish she does less vocal acrobatics, and finds a smoother transitions from the ethnic to the jazz idioms.
The SECOND SET was the MARTIN LUBENOV ORKESTAR Seven pieces band consisting of 6 Bulgarian ethnic musicians, and a Serbian bass player. Martin is a musician who defies the common notion of the accordion musical inferiority. He possesses brilliant technique, taste, finesse, and is deeply rooted in the Bulgarian folk music. He combines this with the jazz idiom seamlessly.
JANUARY 10: ANATOLY VAPIROV DUO with Antony Donchev and a QUARTET with two Austrians Otto Lechner (accordion) and Achim Tang (bass) + Yankoulov on traps and percussion. The Russian born “Diada Tolia" as the Bulgarian jazzmen lovingly call this exceptional tenor sax player and composer, moved to Bulgaria long ago, and is the director of the annual VARNA JAZZ FESTIVAL. I played, and released a couple of recordings with him in the past. Anatoly basically plays free jazz, and I think, I am the only musician with whom he played main stream jazz standards. Both in the duo, and quartet sets he exposed like always a rich tone quality, and very creative spontaneous ideas. For an encore he started with a funny Viennese-like “valse" idea, which the other musicians embraced so well -- it sounded like a written composition. (By the way, every performance was recorded audio, and visually, so let's hope some -- or I wish -- all of it will be released one day). Otto Lechner is another great and extremely tasty accordionist. I think he and Martin increase the small company of Astor Piazzola, Dino Saluzi and few other great accordionists.
JANUARY11. FIRST SET: Antony Donchev's “ACOUSTIC VERSION" trio with Hristo Yotzov, and Vesselin Vesselinov-Eco carried the first set, and how did they carry it! Antony is a pianist, composer (specializing in theater music) from the generation of Bulgarian jazz musicians that came after us, the old ones. They took what we achieved, and developed it further beautifully. This trio actually always has had 2 leaders, and one sideman - Eco in the present time. The group celebrates this year its 20 years existence. Hristo is a serious composer, and he plays the drums composer-like. The material was originals only, mostly by Antony. He presented a very warm, sensitive ballad of his called “Lullaby". “Acoustic Version" is a pride for the Bulgarian Music!
The SECOND SET was the BOSHIDAR SOTIROV QUARTET: Boshidar on saxophones, and flute, Oliver Kent (p), Johannes Strasser (b) and Joris Didli (dr) - the 3 of them Austrians. Boshidar himself has lived, and worked in Vienna for long time. The quartet presented main stream jazz -- standards only -- with gusto, confidence, and taste. This festival had a great variety of all possible aspects of the jazz music today: bop, free, ethnic, classical-jazz, etc.
The variety was demonstrated fully on JANUARY 12 during the BULGARIAN-AUSTRIAN JAM SESSION which I was given the honor to direct. We started with some straight ahead stuff. After “C Jam Blues" I called “I'll Remember April". On the bridge of the tune I realized that the bassist Eko didn't know it. One of the trumpet players, Misho Yosifov nonchalantly walked close to Eko, and pretending like everything was cool started conversing with him, actually dictating quietly the chord changes in Eco's ear. I recalled a saying by Thealonius Monk: “Sometimes you HAVE to play on stage a tune you don't know". After that Theodossii Spassov change the direction drastically with some heavy ethnic stuff combined with a lot of humor. A conga player from Algeria joined us and sounded lake he's been playing Balkan music all his life. And finally there was a riot, when by a suggestion from Theodosii we all came on the stage and played “Peasant Dance". On the 13th of JANUARY I had to fly back to LA, so I missed Theodossii Spassov's closing night, but I am sure he made great music, as always. And again, his participation on the jam the previous night was a real precious gem!
This festival made not one, but SEVEN GIANT STEPS Across the Border!
Milcho Leviev, January 15, North Hollywood, California.
A journal of the 7 Bulgarian Jazz Days in Vienna
Christoph Huber, proprietor of the prestigious Viennese jazz club PORGY AND BESS, Vladimir Vladigerov, and the Bulgarian Ambassador of Austria - her Excellency Elena Kirtcheva, gathered 22 Bulgarians, 7 Austrians, and mixed them for a 7 days festival (January 7-13) called STEP ACROSS THE BORDER: BULGARIA. This endeavor turned out to be one of the mightiest, and truly FESTIVE music events I have ever attended. On JANUARY 4th I boarded an Austrian Airline Boeing, and after nearly 20 hours of avio tortures landed in the city of Beethoven, Mozart, and Dr. Freud. I was given an apartment in the HOUSE OF WITTGENSTEIN - an architectural marvel harboring the BULGARIAN CULTURAL CENTER IN VIENNA. There was something very peculiar about my apartment: its bathroom was bigger than the bedroom. On top of that it seemed that during my stay I had a couple of visits by Mr. Wittgenstein's ghost. In the morning after the second night I was awakened by a loud, crashing noise. I got up, walked in the living room where the huge light fixture from the ceiling was down the floor, shattered into hundreds of tiny pieces of glass! Two days later the apartment's door (while unlocking it from outside) came out of its hinges and started flying inside! I grabbed it just before it would brake the big mirror hanging on the opposite wall of the entry room. Bobby, the house keeper said that he has never had such things happening since he took the job 15 years ago. This fact made my stay even more special.
JANUARY 6th. Rehearsing the quintet for the 2nd set of opening night: Ventzy Blagoev (tp) Georgi Kornazov (tb) Vesselin Vesselinov-Eko (b), Hristo Yotzov (dr) and yours truly on the piano. The piano happened to be a beautiful 9 footer Boesendorfer. I have played previously with all the guys except Georgi Kornazov. After Ivo Papazov, Theodossii Spassov, Vicky Almazidu, and Darinka Tzekova (the incredible gadulka player) Georgi was the next marvelous Bulgarian discovery for me. He lives and works in Paris where he often crosses paths with Glenn Ferris - another great trombonist from the Don Ellis Orchestra. I rehearsed a program consisting entirely of my originals. Georgi played like he wrote them! On the 8th (the second Festival day) he amazed me even more leading also a quintet playing his compositions. But later for that.
JANUARY 7th, 8:00 PM, FIRST SET I am slightly nervous; I have to open the festival with a solo piano set. Playing solo has always been the most difficult music task for me. There is no tossing of ideas. All the ideas has to come from me. It's like music masturbation. My forte is in ensemble playing. Despite this the set went pretty good. In the middle I played one standard, “Lush Life". Ended the set with the inevitable “Bulgarian Boogie". This number, and Gershwin's “Rhapsody In Blue are two pieces I have played hundreds of times. It's a real challenge to make them fresh each time. SECOND SET. The QUINTET playing was a pure joy. The ending number “Women's Dance" got the audience on their feet.
As a SPECIAL FEATURE, at 12:00 midnight the DRUMBOY DUO - Stoyan Yankoulov (drums, percussion, tupan, drumboy) and Elitsa Todorova (vocals, percussion) presented a Bulgarian Ethnic-Jazz set. (The “Drumboy" is the Bulgarian equivalent of the Jew's Harp). Yankoulov is one of the most original percussionists coming from the Balkans. He plays a mean trap drums as well. Elitsa sings straight, no vibrato at all (my favorite type of singing) which is, as every musician knows, the most difficult vocal thing (sorry, opera buffs). This duois a real music tandem; they sound like Siamese twins (or -- like Rimsky and Korssakov, as a music critic once said) The audience sensed this and awarded them with tremendous applause.
JANUARY 8, FIRST SET. Simeon Sterev (fl) and Mario Stanchev(p) Duo. I have known Simeon “Banana"Sterev since the late fifties. In the mid 60ties he, Liuben “the Camel"Borissov(b), Pepi Slavov(dr), and I formed the JAZZ FOCUS 65 Quartet which won the special Critics Prize at the first Montreaux Jazz Festival in 1967. Banana is one of the world's greatest jazz flutist. I knew of Mario Stanchev (he has been living for quite long time in Lion, France) through his father, also a pianist, but I was not acquainted with his musicianship. I've been hearing only good things about his playing -- and it turned out to be more than just “good". Mario is definitely a member of the Tasteful Jazz Musicians League, as a pianist, and composer. He plays with finesse, and French “panache". This made a good contrast later, in the quintet formation, against the powerful and exuberant Georgi Kornazov.
SECOND SET. GEORGI KORNAZOV QUINTET: Georgi (tb) Ventzy (tp) Mario (p) Georg Breinschmid (b) and Christian Salfellner (dr) -- both from Austria. I think this was the highlight of the festival. Georgi's compositions and playing are charged with the highest Dionysius-Orpheus kind of stuff. There is something very primitive combined with high sophistication in his music making -- the kind of Art appealing the most to me.
At midnight a DUO consisting of Vladimir Vladigerov and myself played a set called “Violin and Jazz" as a SPECIAL Feature # 2. That was Vladimir's idea - to present violin music influenced by the jazz idiom. To my knowledge this presentation was the first of its kind. We played arrangements on Scott Joplin by Izhak Perlman, and originals by Kreisler, Misha Elman, Gershwin and myself. Vladimir definitely has the Vladigerov genial musical blood.
JANUARY 9. FIRST SET. YILDIZ IBRAHIMOVA QUARTET: Yildiz (vocal) Antony Donchev (p) Vesselin Vesselinov-Eco (b) and Hristo Yotzov (dr) I've known Yildiz since the early 80ties. We played together in numerous occasions. She is a singer possessing high intelligence, frightening vocal technique, and an impressive stage presence. She made the audience crazy! (By the way, all nights were packed to full capacity with music lovers. “Porgy" seats nearly 500 people!) The only criticism I have about Yildiz's work: I wish she does less vocal acrobatics, and finds a smoother transitions from the ethnic to the jazz idioms.
The SECOND SET was the MARTIN LUBENOV ORKESTAR Seven pieces band consisting of 6 Bulgarian ethnic musicians, and a Serbian bass player. Martin is a musician who defies the common notion of the accordion musical inferiority. He possesses brilliant technique, taste, finesse, and is deeply rooted in the Bulgarian folk music. He combines this with the jazz idiom seamlessly.
JANUARY 10: ANATOLY VAPIROV DUO with Antony Donchev and a QUARTET with two Austrians Otto Lechner (accordion) and Achim Tang (bass) + Yankoulov on traps and percussion. The Russian born “Diada Tolia" as the Bulgarian jazzmen lovingly call this exceptional tenor sax player and composer, moved to Bulgaria long ago, and is the director of the annual VARNA JAZZ FESTIVAL. I played, and released a couple of recordings with him in the past. Anatoly basically plays free jazz, and I think, I am the only musician with whom he played main stream jazz standards. Both in the duo, and quartet sets he exposed like always a rich tone quality, and very creative spontaneous ideas. For an encore he started with a funny Viennese-like “valse" idea, which the other musicians embraced so well -- it sounded like a written composition. (By the way, every performance was recorded audio, and visually, so let's hope some -- or I wish -- all of it will be released one day). Otto Lechner is another great and extremely tasty accordionist. I think he and Martin increase the small company of Astor Piazzola, Dino Saluzi and few other great accordionists.
JANUARY11. FIRST SET: Antony Donchev's “ACOUSTIC VERSION" trio with Hristo Yotzov, and Vesselin Vesselinov-Eco carried the first set, and how did they carry it! Antony is a pianist, composer (specializing in theater music) from the generation of Bulgarian jazz musicians that came after us, the old ones. They took what we achieved, and developed it further beautifully. This trio actually always has had 2 leaders, and one sideman - Eco in the present time. The group celebrates this year its 20 years existence. Hristo is a serious composer, and he plays the drums composer-like. The material was originals only, mostly by Antony. He presented a very warm, sensitive ballad of his called “Lullaby". “Acoustic Version" is a pride for the Bulgarian Music!
The SECOND SET was the BOSHIDAR SOTIROV QUARTET: Boshidar on saxophones, and flute, Oliver Kent (p), Johannes Strasser (b) and Joris Didli (dr) - the 3 of them Austrians. Boshidar himself has lived, and worked in Vienna for long time. The quartet presented main stream jazz -- standards only -- with gusto, confidence, and taste. This festival had a great variety of all possible aspects of the jazz music today: bop, free, ethnic, classical-jazz, etc.
The variety was demonstrated fully on JANUARY 12 during the BULGARIAN-AUSTRIAN JAM SESSION which I was given the honor to direct. We started with some straight ahead stuff. After “C Jam Blues" I called “I'll Remember April". On the bridge of the tune I realized that the bassist Eko didn't know it. One of the trumpet players, Misho Yosifov nonchalantly walked close to Eko, and pretending like everything was cool started conversing with him, actually dictating quietly the chord changes in Eco's ear. I recalled a saying by Thealonius Monk: “Sometimes you HAVE to play on stage a tune you don't know". After that Theodossii Spassov change the direction drastically with some heavy ethnic stuff combined with a lot of humor. A conga player from Algeria joined us and sounded lake he's been playing Balkan music all his life. And finally there was a riot, when by a suggestion from Theodosii we all came on the stage and played “Peasant Dance". On the 13th of JANUARY I had to fly back to LA, so I missed Theodossii Spassov's closing night, but I am sure he made great music, as always. And again, his participation on the jam the previous night was a real precious gem!
This festival made not one, but SEVEN GIANT STEPS Across the Border!
Milcho Leviev, January 15, North Hollywood, California.
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