We're back with an anniversary set that's an excuse to tribute someone I've had in the queue since he passed last year.
You know if you frequent this page that I have a soft spot for Polish Jazz, or maybe even Eastern Eurojazz in general.
In the past I've done posts on luminaries like Krzysztof Komeda and Michel Urbaniak, and today is another superstar in that line.
From the mid 1960s to his passing almost one year ago, our hero blazed a trail of penetrating, sometimes hard-to-categorize music that has him as the Miles Davis of Poland, and considered the greatest trumpet player in the history of his native country.
He began with his own group in the early Sixties and by the middle of the decade was collaborating with Komeda, then the towering figure of all music of Poland, almost.
When Komeda suddenly died, he formed his own group again, and this time he had the mindblowing violinist Zbigniew Seifert in on it. It's that band we feature in the share today.
As Fusion came along, he transitioned into it seamlessly, eventually beginning to record and perform with musicians from all over the world.
As time went on, his music began to incorporate other sounds, but he always emphasized the Jazz element and never allowed his many projects to stray too far from his roots.
His records on Manfred Eicher's critically awesome ECM label are some of the most beautiful on an imprint famous for such qualities.
When his teeth got messed up from so many years of taxing trumpeting, he replaced them and created a whole new embouchure for himself -- ask any trumpet person how easy that is -- and kept right on going.
He left us last year after a half century plus of soundshaping at the forward edge of Jazz, but I know I won't forget the tone and the singularly lyrical compositions of Tomasz Stanko, one of the single greatest musicians to come from Poland and one of the leading lights of the music of the last 50 years.
This concert, recorded 47 years ago today in the Lila Eule in Bremen, is a window into what made him such a powerful figure, and we have it here in topnotch form to celebrate this undersung but indispensibly elegant player.
Tomasz Stanko Quintet
Lila Eule
Bremen, Germany
6.15.1972
01 Wood Music 1
02 Wood Music 2
Total time: 53:54
Tomasz Stanko - trumpet
Janusz Muniak - alto saxophone, flute, percussion
Zbigniew Seifert - violin, alto saxophone, percussion
Bronislav Suchanek - bass
Janusz Stefanski - drums, percussion
digital capture of a 2012 Nordwestradio analog rebroadcast,
combined by EN with the end of a recent and slightly more complete dvb-s transmission
348 MB FLAC/June 2019 archive link
I will get back for the 2nd half of June once I figure out wtf I am posting, and when and what needs work.
Today is the day people who know him nod their heads as to what an underratedly essential cat Stanko was, and for those that don't to get pasted to this killer hour of power so they can find out.--J.
7.11.1942 - 7.29.2018
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