It was the feeling of magic that Grzech Piotrowski’s World Orchestra concert starring Bulgarian and Polish musicians created at Jazz FM’s Sofia Jazz Peak festival. Those who were looking for an answer about the power of community that traditions give us, found it in contact and participation. Both musicians and audience created and shared energy drawing upon the roots and the dream of a better future. Folk music of different peoples, inspiredly presented by excellent musicians, touched in our souls the eternal knowledge of the universe and the meaning of life that determine us as human beings. Deep as this knowledge is, we only realize it as defining the road we travel. And that was a road of fantasy and imagination that we walked in the 150 minutes of this concert. Not knowing each other, we became friends.
Grzech Piotrowski – composer, conductor, saxophone, Theodosii Spassov – composer, kaval (a traditional Bulgarian wooden wind instrument), the women choir Bulgarian Voices Angelite (The Angels) conducted by Georgi Petkov, string quartet of The Classic FM Orchestra (Lyudmil Nenchev – violin, Galya Koicheva – Mircheva – violin, Jiril Hristov – viola, Christiana Mihaylova – cello), the Polish Atom String Quartet and a Polish jazz trio (Marcin Wasilewski – piano, Sebastian Wypych – bass, Robert Luty – drums) were those amazing musicians that used traditional music, expressing it in the jazz and classical music idiom, to invite us in the magical world of faith, hope and love.
This event was part of our Sofia Jazz Peak festival and the European Music Festival presented by Cantus Firmus. We dedicated the concert to the International Jazz Day – 30th of April. The co-organizer The Polish Institute in Sofia celebrated the 65th anniversary of its establishment with this event. The concert was supported by the Municipality of Sofia and the Ministry of Culture and was part of Sofia and The South-Western Region’s bid to be European Capital of Culture in 2019.
Photo credits: Miroslav Zlatev – Bulphoto photo agency (where noted) and Yanko Dimitrov
