Interplay Jazz Duo - Interplay Jazz Duo (Jazz Forum, 2012)

Interplay Jazz Duo

Kamil Urbanski - piano
Jedrzej Laciak - bass

Interplay Jazz Duo (Jazz Forum, 2012)

(Editor) This is first text by Dirk Blasejezak on our blog. I hope our cooperation will develop over time. I welcome his musical taste and personal point of view on jazz as precious contribution to this site.

Sometimes musicians come together, who understand each other blindly and seem to complement the other one in every moment. With Bill Evans and Scott LaFaro this might have been the case, at least it is reported that Bill Evans fell in a deep depression after the premature death of LaFaro and that it took him months to recover - and there are people who think that he never did recover.

Between Kamil Urbanski and Jedrzej Laciak too seems to be a connection. Apparently light-footed they seem to glide through complex passages - always with an ear for the partner - and the many tempo changes they master together like somnambulists. Here are two playing with and not against each other. No image neurosis disturbs the flow, instead, everyone knows when he needs to take back and leave the field to the other. And when a gap opens up, it is always filled with a true sense for the situation and the parts just played. For the listener this means uninterrupted listening joy without any boredom. Conspicuous, or rather not ear-catching is the fact that here are only two musicians at work - you won´t miss a drummer and no other musician at all, and that's the really remarkable thing about this debut

In 2010 the two musicians, who both studied at the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music in Katowice, founded the Interplay Jazz Duo. Kamil Urbanski studied composition and arrangement and gathered quite some experience on this field in various projects. He could also already collect various awards and honors for his piano playing. Jedrzej Laciak is also active as a composer, although he studied the bass. He was guided at the academy by Maciej Garbowski (RGG, MACIEJ OBARA QUARTET) - whether this is apparent in these recordings is up to the listener to decide. Jedrzej Laciak plays an acoustic bass guitar here and not the double bass though.

The music itself is, as could be expected with regards to these bios, completely composed. Striking are countless tempo changes, which show how well the “interplay” of the two actually is! Collective free improvisation for longer passages you won´t find here. However, if you appreciate beautifully arranged compositions or every now and then enjoy to simply relax and relish good music - you will have a lot of fun with this record. Maybe this is also the single weak point: There are not many highlights that tear you out of your dreams. It can happen that the record suddenly stops and you have a hard time to remember single passages.

A direct comparison is probably risky: But if Bill Evans and Scott LaFaro had ever gotten the chance to record a LP as a duet ... maybe it would have sounded a bit like this one ... 

By Dirk Blasejezak