All music by: Marek Pospieszalski
Marek Pospieszalski: prepared saxophone
Recorded at Radio Krakow by Grzegorz Dąbek, June of 2019
Mixed and Mastered: Michał Kupicz
This album has waited a very long time for its release.
It would be a truism to write how these last years have bedevilled us all.
Marek Pospieszalski has managed to turn this period into a very creative and artistically good time for him - two great albums released on the Clean Feed.
"Joyous" - solo work is perhaps the first recording in this trillogy (?) although only published this year. It is like an "introduction to the unknown".
Perhaps this unintentional delay, caused by my tardiness, will allow this material to sound better after the aforementioned discs in the series "Polish Composers of the 20th Century" and "Durer's Mother" inspired by the music of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The artist is slowly gaining his rightful position by taking a circuitous route through publications on a recognised jazz label. Although this album may prove to be a ''quirk'' for some of his fans, for me it rather catapults the instrument into the 21st century, which is what appeals to me most about Bocian Records at the moment.
This year will also see the release of an album by violinist Erkki Velthaim, who gives his instrument a similar treatment. What treatments?
Well, this excellent saxophonist 'embellishes' Joyous with a very modest melodic resource and even reduces the sound, often placing purely pitch manipulations in the foreground.
Marek Pospieszaski's music on this album (and in his solo concerts) treats feedback not as an 'acoustic accident' but as the controlling theme of his works. In this sense, his solo work is very similar to what he presents in his Malediwy project with percussionist Qba Janicki (also on Bocian with his solo LP "Intuitive Mathematics"), in which he creates a kind of interweaving sound stream of unknown source. Both, solo and Malediwy are strictly composed, and although he allows himself to improvise at concerts, the overriding goal seems to be internal control.
Ten album bardzo długo czekał na swoją premierę. Byłoby truizmem pisać, jak te ostatnie lata nękały nas wszystkich. Markowi Pospieszalskiemu udało się ten okres zamienić w bardzo twórczy i artystycznie dobry dla niego czas – dwie świetne płyty wydane na Clean Feed. "Joyous" - materiał solowy jest chyba pierwszym nagraniem w tej trylogii (?), choć wydanej dopiero w tym roku. To jest jak „wstęp w nieznane”. Być może to niezamierzone opóźnienie, spowodowane moim spóźnieniem, pozwoli temu materiałowi lepiej zabrzmieć po wspomnianych płytach z serii „Polish Composers of the 20th Century” i „Durer's Mother” inspirowanych muzyką XIX i początku XX wieku. Artysta powoli dochodzi do należnej mu pozycji, idąc okrężną drogą przez publikacje w uznanej wytwórni jazzowej. Chociaż ten album może okazać się „dziwactwem” dla niektórych jego fanów, dla mnie jest to raczej katapulta instrumentu w XXI wiek.