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Alina Bzhezhinska & Tony Kofi: Tabula Rasa-Blank Slate
by Ian Patterson
Having played together since 2015, harpist Alina Bzhezhinska and saxophonist Tony Kofi have developed a keen musical understanding. In 2024 they released the gorgeous duo album, Altera Vita (BBE Records), which moved the late Chris May to write: “This ineffably beautiful and restorative disc succeeds resoundingly in its mission statement. This is, say the duo, to offer listeners something that “guides us through the turbulence and discord" of what has become “an era yearning for serenity, spirituality and peace." Amen ...
Continue ReadingBrilliant Corners 2025: Days 5-8
by Ian Patterson
Brilliant Corners 2025 Black Box/Various Venues jny:Belfast, N. IrelandFebruary 28-March 8, 2025 If the first four days of Brilliant Corners 2025 leaned towards long-form contemporary composition and free improvisation, the music of the last four days had a more spiritual tone, and a more heavily African-accented character. Many would say that all music comes from God, or that it is an offering to God, but as became clear, others find creative inspiration in much more ...
Continue ReadingAlina Bzhezhinska & Tony Kofi: Altera Vita
by Chris May
Harpist Alina Bzhezhinska and saxophonist Tony Kofi's musical partnership began in 2015 and two years later made the main stage of the London Jazz Festival, opening the bill of A Concert For Alice And John at the Barbican concert hall. Also appearing, saxophonist Denys Baptiste's quartet and, top of the bill, Pharoah Sanders' quartet. It was a magical night. It would be an exaggeration to say that the relatively unknown Bzhezhinska stole the show (Sanders did that with the standard ...
Continue ReadingGanavya: Forgive Me My
by Chris May
London-based multi-reedist Shabaka Hutchings' interest in South and East Asian music, which recently manifested itself with his embarkation on an in-depth study of Japanese shakuhachi flutes, continues to spread its wings. Hutchings does not play on singer and composer Ganavya's meditative single “Forgive Me My," but he produced the track and it is released on his Native Rebel Recordings label. An album will be released later in 2023. Meanwhile, you can hear “Forgive Me My" on the YouTube below.
Continue ReadingAlina Bzhezhinska & HipHarpCollective: Reflections
by Chris May
In an inspired piece of programming, London's Barbican Centre presented the then virtually unknown harpist Alina Bzhezhinska and her quartet as one of the support bands on its November 18, 2017 one-nighter A Concert for Alice and John, a show headlined by Pharoah Sanders. It would be an exaggeration to say Bzhezhinska stole the show (see “Pharoah Sanders" above), but she was sensational, offering up fresh readings of Alice Coltrane tunes and a few originals, accompanied by Tony Kofi on ...
Continue ReadingAlina Bzhezhinska Quartet At Regional Cultural Centre
by Ian Patterson
Alina Bzhezhinska Quartet Regional Cultural Centre Letterkenny, Ireland February 15, 2020 History owes Alice Coltrane much more than the moniker of “John Coltrane's wife." Alina Bzhezhinska makes the point early on to the Letterkenny audience, on this, the final night of her quartet's ten-date Irish tour. A fine, pianist, harpist composer and bandleader, Alice Coltrane was, Bzhezhinska says, a significant figure in her own right, not least for the forty or so albums ...
Continue ReadingAlina Bzhezhinska: Inspiration
by Roger Farbey
There have been precious few harpists in jazz. Dorothy Ashby was one, David Snell who made a memorable contribution to John Dankworth's What The Dickens! (Fontana Records, 1963) was another. But surely the most famous of them all was Alice Coltrane. So it is that Alina Bzhezhinska has dedicated this album to her heroine. It's a timely release too, as its recording dates in late 2017 marked the tenth anniversary of Alice Coltrane's passing and the fiftieth year since her ...
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