Kraków Jazz Week is an umbrella brand for a fusion of events that occupy a vitally important place in the cultural landscape of Lesser Poland’s regional capital. Over eight days, two competitions and a festival will be held at the Cricoteka club situated right on the bank of the Vistula River at the very heart of the city. KJW opens with events that commemorate one of Kraków’s most outstanding artists: the violinist, saxophonist and composer Zbigniew Seifert.
The organisers tirelessly promote Seifert’s legacy by holding a competition of his name as well as a festival known as Seifert Jazz Days. The Seifert Competition, held already for the sixth time, has undoubtedly proved its efficacy as a way of reviving and cultivating the output of that Kraków-based musician. Owing to its international character, it perfectly promotes Seifert’s music not only at home, but also worldwide. The broad response to this year’s edition prove that the fame of the violin genius from Kraków has reached all continents, and that the Competition itself as well as Kraków Jazz Week have become a strongly recognisable brand to be reckoned with in the global music market. While drawing on its history and continuing the splendid traditions of the Jazz Juniors Festival, the brand also stands for new qualities represented by the biennial Seifert Competition and Seifert Jazz Days.
Directly after the 6th Seifert Competition winners have been announced, auditions for this year’s Jazz Juniors Competition will follow. The latter, Kraków-based event has attracted young jazz performers for nearly half a century, frequently introducing its audience to new talents that were later applauded on prestigious concert stages at home and abroad. Notably, the very fact of participation in the Jazz Juniors finals paves the way for the young contestants to performing at major European festivals, in venues and on tours worldwide. What counts most is thus the chance to meet and establish international and intergenerational contacts within the global jazz community. The element of rivalry itself being largely a convention, the event will nevertheless surely stir up plenty of emotions. Importantly. Kraków Jazz Week is not exclusively a set of two competitions for young music interpreters and improvisers. There will also be a concert series programmed by one of the most innovative artists in the European jazz scene – Nils Petter Molvær, who as of this year holds the post of Jazz Juniors Festival’s artistic director.
SEIFERT COMPETITION 26 - 29 September 2024
Ten artists, selected by an international jury consisting of Michał Urbaniak, Anja Lechner, and Ernst Reijseger on the basis of submitted entries, will perform on 26 and 27 September on Kraków Jazz Week’s main stage in Cricoteka. The list of Seifert Competition semi-finalists is as follows:
ANAIS DRAGO (Italy)
A violinist opting for jazz, improvisation, electroacoustic and pop music. Despite her young age she already has three original albums to her name, in addition to numerous prizes and distinctions in various competitions and festivals. Though in the last several years she has dedicated much time to a solo career, she has also attracted considerable attention with her duo performances with Italian jazz legend Enrico Rava.
TOMOHIRO ISHII (Japan)
A violinist and composer from a musical family, he took up the instrument at barely four years of age. Classically educated since childhood, he has won multiple awards and distinctions in national and international violin competitions. During his studies at the Tokyo University of the Arts he was drawn to jazz, which naturally led to a development of his own personal language of improvisation. His adventure with composing music began in the same period. Ishii is a co-founder of Less is More String Quartet and the founder of Mi Mi Mi Records. He also writes music for the cinema and arranges pop numbers for other performers.
ALEKSANDRA KRYŃSKA (Poland)
A violinist with a wide range of interests, she graduated from Prof. Wiesław Kwaśny’s class at the Cracow Academy of Music and Mateusz Smoczyński’s class at Warsaw’s Chopin University of Music. Winner of numerous scholarships for academic excellence, she explores chamber, ethnic, and jazz repertoires, performing both classical and jazz music in orchestras and ensembles as well as leading her own bands, among others in collaboration with Piotr Damasiewicz and Szymon Mika.
WOJTEK MACIEJOWSKI (Poland)
His violin-playing fascinations derive from the musical culture of his homeland – the Żywiec range of the Beskid mountains. At the successive stages of his education he broadened his interests to include the traditions of other Carpathian regions – until also this proved not enough to him as an artist. His search for an extended musical language led him naturally to jazz and to his graduation from the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied with Prof. Henryk Gembalski. He now performs and collaborates with, among others, Hanka Wójciak Band, PoPieronie Band, Mateusz Smoczyński, Michał Aftyka, and Jarek Bothur.
ANDREW FINN MAGILL (USA)
Violinist and film music composer. Though he is educated in many violin genres and styles, his teenage fascination with the recordings of Hot Club de France and Charlie Parker proved a crucial influence. Frequently praised for the lightness of his playing and ‘effortless virtuosity’, Finn Magill has worked with such musicians as Michael Jeffrey Stephens and members of Snarky Puppy, among others.
AMALIA UMEDA OBRĘBOWSKA (Poland)
Improviser and composer, leader of a quartet of her name, she has played the violin since her seventh year, growing more and more self-aware as an instrumentalist with the passage of years. She boldly treads her own path and takes risks in her improvisations. Rather than limiting herself to the violin, she also includes the viola and her own voice in her performances. Her quartet’s debut has brought critical and audience recognition and acclaim. She also performs solo in many parts of the world.
CHASE POTTER (USA)
A multi-instrumentalist now based in New York, he graduated with honours from Boston’s Berklee College of Music. Despite his inborn ease in mastering various instruments (incl. drums, saxes, the guitar), he has principally remained faithful to his first choice, the violin. Skills demonstrated since early childhood as well as his versatility have led to performances with artists as diverse as Wynton Marsalis, Lalah Hathaway, Belle & Sebastian, as well as Machine Gun Kelly and Camila Cabello. With that latter duo he appeared in the cult-status series of The Tonight Show.
HUGO VAN RECHEM (France)
A multi-instrumentalist and composer working at the intersection of contemporary classical, electronic pop and jazz music. He is fond of, and inspired by, contrasts and untypical combinations of various trends and genres. He studied classical music at the Conservatoire de Lille, and later jazz at Paris Conservatory. As an instrumentalist he performs in orchestras, jazz and progressive rock bands, as well as playing ambient and minimal music.
MICHAŁ SCHAB (Poland)
Violinist and educator, he graduated from Prof. Beata Solnicka’s class in the Karol Lipiński Academy of Music in Wrocław and Prof. Henryk Gembalski’s class at the G. and K. Bacewicz University of Music in Łódź. Apart from grassroots blues (that he grew up with) and his classical university education, he has for many years explored jazz improvisation strategies, reflected, among others, in the music of the quartet he is the leader of.
JOÃO DA SILVA (Portugal)
Music was present in his family home on an everyday basis. Da Silva decided to continue the family’s music-making traditions but took them from an amateur to a professional level. It was on this strong foundation that his extraordinary passion was born, driving him to explore ever new artistic fields. In his music, he draws on both classical and jazz influences, appearing as a composer and performer, but also as a highly regarded arranger and producer, thus – a person entirely dedicated to the musical profession in all its forms.
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It is from among those ten that five finalists will be selected, who will meet at the Cricoteka again on 28 September to compete for the main prizes of the 6th Seifert Competition. Throughout the auditions, participants will be accompanied by the trio of eminent jazz pianist Dominik Wania, a teacher at Cracow’s Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music. The trio’s lineup is as follows: Dominik Wania – piano, Michał Kapczuk – bass, and Dawid Fortuna – drums.
SEIFERT COMPETITION’S GALA CONCERT: 29 September 2024
Apart from the winners’ concert, the first part of this year’s Kraków Jazz Week ends will a performance by an unusual cello-and-piano duo: Anja Lechner and François Couturier, one of the world’s leading cello ensembles, whose music has for years been inextricably linked to jazz and improvisation. They delight audiences with their imaginative interpretations, ease and expertise. Their contribution is the more valuable since, despite featuring in some jazz bands since the late 1940s, the cello is still neither popular nor by any means obvious in this genre.
Tickets: bilety24
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