Sunday 16 June 2024, 2pm
We invite you to a concert of artists associated with the Polish, independent record label and the L.A.S. Listening and Sounding Foundation. During the event, we will have the opportunity to hear excellent musicians and get acquainted with the idea and albums of the publishing house. The music of the trio draws from the language of jazz, 20th-century classical music, ethnic music, as well as the latest music, including European improvised and experimental music. The composed and conjointly improvised parts have equal importance, and as an act of momentary creating and communicating between musicians and audiences, the faint, transitory aspect of music is the main focus.
Co-financed by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage as part of the Center for the Development of Creative Industries' own program: Development of Creative Sectors.
Piotr Damasiewicz – composer, trumpeter, multi-instrumentalist, educator, traveller and curator of international music platforms. In addition to the trumpet, he also studied double bass, piano and classical singing – including Gregorian chant – choral and chamber conducting, arrangement and composition. In his work, he uses the language of jazz, 20th-century classical music, ethnic music, modern music, along with European improvised music and experiment.
Damasiewicz has represented Poland on four international music platforms: Take Five Europe, Jazz Plays Europe Laboratory, Art Meetings and Melting Pot Laboratory (Jazztopad). In the last two, as a leader, composer and instrumentalist, he developed the idea of open improvisation in contact with other fields of art. Currently, he is taking a doctor’s degree at the Instrumental Department of Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz.
Guitarist, composer, vice-president of the foundation.
Chris Kasprzyk is a Polish saxophonist living in Vienna. After studying classical saxophone in Krakow, he moved to Graz, Austria in the year 2000 to study at the Institute for Jazz of the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz (Dr. Karl- Böhm Scholarship 2002) and from 2003 at the University of Music in Vienna . Since then he has been working intensively on mainly improvised music and sound research.
He plays with numerous Austrian and international musicians of the jazz and improvised music scene, also works as a session musician with artists from hip-hop and singer-songwriter circles.
As a leader, he has recorded albums with the trio 'Public Exposure' (Martin Burk (D) and Alex Yannilos (AT) and a series of piano duets with Sylvia Bruckner (AT) that can be heard on digital platforms.
Jazz Vocalist of the Year & Mobo Nominated: Cleveland Watkiss 2017
Internationally renowned vocalist won the London Jazz Award for Best Vocalist in 2010, and was voted Wire/Guardian Jazz Awards best vocalist for three consecutive years.
Watkiss was born in Hackney, East London, to Jamaican parents. Watkiss was one of the co-founders of the vastly influential Jazz Warriors big band. His vocals can be heard on their debut album, Out of Many People.
Watkiss has performed with a diverse range of artists from around the world, including: The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Carlinos Brown, Wynton Marsalis, Bob Dylan, Thurston Moore, Art Blakey, Abdullah Ibrahim, Stevie Wonder, Keith Richards, Bheki Mseleku, Fabio & Grooverider, William Parker, the James Taylor Quartet, Sly & Robbie, Nigel Kennedy, Robbie Williams, Joe Cocker, The Who, George Martin, Julian Joseph, Black Top, the London Chamber Orchestra, the BBC Orchestra, Cassandra Wilson, Louis Moholo, and the London Community Gospel Choir, Hamid Drake, & Project 23, Goldie. More recently, demonstrating great versatility, Cleveland was cast as the starring role in Julian Joseph’s, two groundbreaking jazz operas, Bridgetower and Shadowball, to considerable acclaim.
In June last year he performed with vibraphonist Orphy Robinson at Freedom: The Art of Improvisation Festival at The Vortex, performing their project Duke Joint. Also with a project London-Chicago Vibration in Nov’ at the London Jazz Festival, a 50th anniversary tribute to the Chicago-based Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) led by multi-percussionist Orphy Robinson and an all-star band of UK-based improvisers including legendary drummer Louis Moholo vibist Corey Mwamba and saxophonist Jason Yarde.
