Jean-Pierre Froehly. Away from the crowd. The music of Attila Zoller.

(item from the "Rare Discs" section)
There is the impression that Ukrainian jazz today is deep in, let us say, searching for its own face – more and more authors' music of various types is being created and released. This is cool. And that is why, presumably, it is expectable that our musicians did not have a chance for a while to come in contact with the "traditional" jazz – in the sense of the tradition of releasing arrangements of "evergreens" and various tributes. In the whole Ukrainian discography one will find, maybe, a dozen of such albums – and one of them, a dedication to Attila Zoller, you see now. Thus, what is characteristic, not a Ukrainian became the initiator of this project: Jean-Pierre Froehly till recently was the cultural attaché of the embassy of Germany for Ukraine. And at the same time – one of the most active musicians in the Ukrainian jazz space.

Probably, you know music by Zoller. The key zest of this album, however, is that the main emphasis is put, strangely enough, not quite on the guitar. The impression is that together with drums and the contrabass it creates the basic canvas, and the already mentioned contrabass together with the flute and, from time to time, the piano – add to the sounding the brightest and deepest colors, and not only solo (here we should do justice to Maksim Gladetsky and Volodymyr Zinkovsky). However, it is exactly such neat, soft, tolerant sounding of Froehly's guitar that looks very, very much appropriate here. And the drums by Oleksander Khorev deserve separate gratitude: he involves with not authority, but, one could say, a tender technique. Does nothing superfluous – and at that quietly let us enjoy the nuances. To make it short, if you have been looking for tasty, harmonious mainstream, this album is what you really should try in a soft evening.

Jean-Pierre Froehly – guitar
Vladimir Zinkovsky – flute, piano
Max Gladetsky – double bass
Alexander Chorev – drums