Some background

The concert was performed in the Collegium Polonicum Hall of the Europa-Universität Viadrina in Słubice as part of the “Musikfesttage an der Oder / Dni muzyki nad Odrą” series of concerts co-organized by German and Polish cities. I find the general idea very pleasing, being myself part of similar ventures during high school.

What’s special about this particular concert was that it welcomed a brand new Yamaha grand piano. To date, there were no publicly available instruments of that kind available in Słubice. Fortunately, the need was eventually fulfilled and the grand piano began its service. And what a beginning it was!

The theme

The concert was themed “Pasodoble”, after the name of the album Lars and Leszek did together. To avoid being obvious and repeating official press materials I will just point you here if you don’t know what the traditional paso doble is. The important part is how this dance of two natures worked as a driving theme of the performance.

I have to say I didn’t do any particular reasoning behind the name of the album, or its minimalistic cover. But at the concert it stroked me: the independent lines that finally go together, the double step, the dialog between two distinct entities that produces a coherent whole. This is it. Actually seeing the musicians performing was like having an additional formerly missing viewpoint required to comprehend the body of work.

The improvisation

This is what this site is all about and if it wasn’t for this part of the show, I wouldn’t post my review here. But Danielsson and Możdżer presented yet another viewpoint to the albums they did together by vastly rearranging the pieces. There were various means of improvisation involved, from simple shifts of themes to complete overhauls of the melodic structure. A frequent act was to introduce a piece by veiling it for a while with an unrelated introduction. Possibly they were parts of other pieces by the musicians which I unfortunately did not recognise. From my perspective, the third encore was entirely improvisation, just proving how well did the guys understand each other. They played as if synchronised.

Lars Danielsson

This is the man I know particularly for his co-operation with Leszek Możdżer. I never actually focused on his parts when I listened to their recordings, being completely overwhelmed by sounds of the piano. During yesterday’s performance things came to a sudden change. I can only agree with himself saying that he is from the same planet as Leszek. He could easily be called “the Możdżer of the cello” if you excuse my cumbersome simile.

When I first found out that Lars released a new album, Tarantella, I was just barely interested because Leszek was listed amongst other musicians Lars invited to play on it. Now I know that Danielsson’s record history goes as far back as to 1983. He must and he is popular among certain niches and I’m very glad that he broadens his reachability by working with other amazing musicians with their own fan base. I’m glad because attending the concert mostly for the performance of the Polish jazz pianist, I discovered the true power of Lars Danielsson’s expression.

He was playing mostly the double bass, occasionally switching to the cello. And these switches were the most fabulous. I’m sorry Leszek but Lars just stole the concert from you at the moments when he was crafting sound on his violoncello. I am no particular fan of pure technical performance and I often find that the most well rounded renditions lack the general atmosphere and the story between the lines. Lars did just the opposite, his craftsmanship was undoubtul but not tiringly technical. The instrument was a tool of expression that worked just right for him. The star moment was the introduction to Suffering, a brilliant delicate piece.

The pianist

I would need a whole website just to describe my fascination with this pianist. Here I will just point out a few of particularly apt observations:

• Leszek’s usage of additional objects to alter the sound of certain piano registers is pure genius and just shows how much is still to explore
• Możdżer has a rare gift of pristine phrase expression, this is especially visible on crafted melodies composed by Lars or Zbigniew Preisner
• he represents an unstrained sense of humour which could be seen on some occasions during the performance
• I can’t say for other live performances but just this one presented his parts in often much more technically advanced and convoluted ways

Summary

I was very happy to be able to attend. Being there and experiencing a genuine performance was very inspiring. Ah, and the photos are by me.

Tags: leszek możdżer, lars danielsson, słubice, piano, contrabass, cello, pasodoble, live