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Jazzing up Russian, all-mix style
Feb. 6th, 2009 02:24 amYesterday I came back to the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan, for the first time after "Gimpel Tam" musical had been over (in late December). This time it was a different show, the Russian Jazz Improvisation night, which followed my 4-month-long internet acquaintance wit Borislav Strulev, a brilliant Russian cellist who has resided in New York for about 15 years. Honestly, I felt somewhat nervous when I entered the familiar hall, The Coldman-Sonnenfeldt Family Auditorium in JCC.
We had never played together with Borislav before. I mean, never played, not just never performed.
His ideas of what and how to do, when I heard them back in December, sounded to me somewhat strange, if not awkward. But finally it worked out. This is exactly as it is with food: it's hard to spoil really good ingredients when cooking.
Leonid Loginov-Katz, a fantastic jazz pianist, also became an outstanding partner for us who were on stage – Borislav, Mikhail Svetlov, a Russian-American bass; a talented pianist Yana Manovskaya who had masterfully learned a bunch of pieces in a couple of days for this gig; Astrid 'Luma' Steiner, a VJ, who moved to the Big Apple from Austria just last year, and myself.
The audience was mostly of the Russian descent. And they sure seemed to enjoy the polystylistic mix of everything they was offered. Klezmer, Schnittke, Bloch, Rachmaninov, Massnet, Ellington, Russian romances, nearly everyting with a touch of jazz injected by hilarious Leo Loginov Katz, – they "ate it up" all, with a shot of Russian vodka. Even after Leo had injured his finger while playing on grand piano's bare strings, he went on with the show, removing the blood traces off the piano keys.
There's one thing I leave with a question mark:
Does the esthetical and stylistic pantophagy lie in the Russians' national character? I really don't know the answer, as I am not Russian. And is it because Russia (or rather Moscow) is, and has been for centuries, a huge multicultural crossroad? If so, New York should be a perfect stage to put such shows on.
We had never played together with Borislav before. I mean, never played, not just never performed.
His ideas of what and how to do, when I heard them back in December, sounded to me somewhat strange, if not awkward. But finally it worked out. This is exactly as it is with food: it's hard to spoil really good ingredients when cooking.
Leonid Loginov-Katz, a fantastic jazz pianist, also became an outstanding partner for us who were on stage – Borislav, Mikhail Svetlov, a Russian-American bass; a talented pianist Yana Manovskaya who had masterfully learned a bunch of pieces in a couple of days for this gig; Astrid 'Luma' Steiner, a VJ, who moved to the Big Apple from Austria just last year, and myself.
The audience was mostly of the Russian descent. And they sure seemed to enjoy the polystylistic mix of everything they was offered. Klezmer, Schnittke, Bloch, Rachmaninov, Massnet, Ellington, Russian romances, nearly everyting with a touch of jazz injected by hilarious Leo Loginov Katz, – they "ate it up" all, with a shot of Russian vodka. Even after Leo had injured his finger while playing on grand piano's bare strings, he went on with the show, removing the blood traces off the piano keys.
There's one thing I leave with a question mark:
Does the esthetical and stylistic pantophagy lie in the Russians' national character? I really don't know the answer, as I am not Russian. And is it because Russia (or rather Moscow) is, and has been for centuries, a huge multicultural crossroad? If so, New York should be a perfect stage to put such shows on.
