Olo Walicki is bassist and composer, born in 1974 in Gdansk. He was among those who in early 90ties created yass, refreshing and rejuvenating movement on Polish jazz scene, taking place in Tri City (Gdańsk, Gdynia, Sopot) which put more stress on free and improvised element in music than mainstream jazz which up-to-that-date was dominant in Poland. He collaborated with such significant figures of this movement as Jerzy Mazzoll, Jacek Olter (they played together in band called Blue Pilot), Tymon Tymański, Mikołaj Trzaska and Leszek Możdżer - all of them (except Olter who committed suicide) are now creme de creme of Polish jazz. But he never limited himself to only one paradigm, apart from yass he was also present in mainstream playing in Zbigniew Namysłowski Quartet, in free jazz Łoskot (Din) and in alternative pop Szwagierkolaska and Oczi Cziorne. So it comes as no surprise that in 2003 he began to cooperate with Ingmar Villqist, Swedish director, in order to create music for his theater productions. And although I am rather skeptical as far as theater music is concerned to be able to stand alone on itself I must admit that this music has potential to keep jazz listener attention for its own sake. At least this is exactly the story which happened with myself because from the very first notes of this album I could not stop to listen to it and then not to buy it. Strong rhythms, polyphonies, dark and ominous mood of this music captivate me and made puzzled. Whether your reaction shall be similar to mine you can check by listening to some samples of this music from artist's web page:
http://www.olowalicki.com/mp3.php?id=11
Author: Maciej Nowotny
http://kochamjazz.blox.pl/html
