Customer Reviews

Live Embers

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"I play what I want", say Adam Makowicz. And, incidentally, "what-he-wants" pleases also the audience. "I endeavor to communicate listeners with all the emotion and joy that playing gives me." He does it perfectly well, and this is the reason for his popularity and enthusiasm around his solo music.

No doubt, he is one of the most eminent European jazz pianists; some people say that he is... the best. And it is quite possible, since after the last Piano Conclave that brought together European giants of the piano, a Swiss critic wrote: "None of the pianists revealed such a variety of style - from Art Tatum to Keith Jarrett - as Makowicz. His impressions were the biggest solo attraction of the evening."

That's it: Tatum and Jarrett. It is them that Makowicz often refers to as to his favorites. Nevertheless, it is not merely their influence that made his music so attractive. Their ideas were employed by Makowicz as a substratum for creating his own deeply personal but very communicative music.

This music reminds of Tatum's rippling passages, Jarrett's lyricism, stride piano and... ragtime. The whole image of jazz found its place in Makowicz's art. "Live Embers" is a perfect portrait of his music. The title original composition, which opens and closes the record, is a sort of a clamp buckling the whole miscellaneous material of the disc; it is also somehow the artist's creed, a recapitulation of everything that is happening on the record. Besides original Makowicz's compositions, one may find here Scott Joplin's rags, "The Entertainer" and "Solace", as well as the extremely different Coltrane's "Count Down" and "Giant Steps".

Unbelievable technique, extreme sensitivity and imagination of the pianist made this record an important event not only in Polish jazz, but also a genuine and sensational masterpiece, that seldom is available in jazz of Europe and... the world. If these words seem to you exaggerated, I can only say: just listen to it.

(original line notes from the album's back cover)