News

Jan Kopinski (tenor and soprano saxes) – guest soloist with PRS (Simon Potts drums/ Steve Rodda guitar/ Mat Short bass) 

Saturday 13 April 3pm at Strays Coffee in Middlegate, Newark, Nottinghamshire.

Offers the chance to humbly work through some of the great masters’ work with some nice blokes in a relaxing environment. ‘Humbly’, because much of the work is the Holy Grail for many sax players, and the conundrum of not just playing the material but scaling the massive wall of endeavour and accomplishments that these masters landed on every sax player since is… a challenge !! But the main problem is that any interpretation is never going to equal theirs because the music is so infused and identified with their character and persona;they, as composers and performers, create a unique work each time they perform. But……they are still out there as great compositions,  and to play them makes the player ponder more on how to play them and see their own reflection.

Although I’ve studied them a lot (in particular Coltrane and Ornette) I usually play my own material or that of pianist Steve Iliffe and others from Pinski Zoo. so when I do get the chance it is always a test of musicality and, for me, humility. After that, of course it’s great fun ! I love ‘Impressions’ and ‘Lonely Woman’. Hope to see you there

Live Music to Film -26 March 2019, 7.30pm

 Walter Ruttmann’s definitive ‘city film’ is a dawn to dusk portrait of 1920s Berlin, combining documentary, abstract and lyrical imagery. With Karl Freund’s masterly camerawork and the film’s assured editing, BERLIN was hugely successful on its release, and that rarity – a film both popular and avant-garde.

Berlin: Symphony of a Great City contains moments of poetry that have seldom been equalled in film. The lyrical tone is set from the start with the opening shots of a dawn train journey towards the city. A subtle arching of time throughout the acts and seamless editing foreshadows the documentary style of later films. And beneath the immediate sense of objectivity to the film, there are touches of engaging warmth as Ruttman revels in the tapestry of human ingenuity, creativity and flow of life in the big city. The editing and sheer breadth of detail merges the documentary and visual narrative into a masterful film achievement.

REFLEKTOR2 – Pianist Steve Iliffe and I perform our original score live to the film and follow it’s five acts of the daily diary of a city moving from the rhythmic to the abstract. Mirroring the pace and dazzle of the editing, the music responds to the human curiosity and the wonder of how we find ourselves in the modern world.

Lakeside Arts Djanogly Theatre – 13th March 2019, 7.30pm .

More details https://www.lakesidearts.org.uk/…/…/reflektor-der-golem.html

REFLEKTOR2 (Jan Kopinski – sax/ Steve Iliffe -piano) perform their original music to the 1920 classic German expressionistic film, Der Golem – based upon a Jewish tale from Eastern Europe, of a creature brought to life by Rabbi Loew in 16th century Prague to save his people from the persecution by the Holy Roman Emperor. A mixture of mysticism, terror and love – a great film by director Paul Wegener (who plays the creature himself) from the Weimar period and widely considered to be an influence on the later Frankenstein.

we love playing to this film with its run time of approx 90 mins!

Happy New Year ! …if you have the time, have a listen to my latest album Eye of The Sea. It’s a special one for me, as it is the last concert I played with drummer Steve Harris who died shortly following our performance at the improvising festival he organised in Poole, Dorset, UK. It is also a very personal duet. Steve by this time was more interested in purely improvised forms and plays with delicacy as well as power. Also it was the right moment to include more of the techniques on tenor sax where I had full rein to use a combination of pure sax technique and electro-acoustic treatments, including feedback. I had a definite idea of landscape and people within that.

The name of the album comes from a lake in the Polish Tatras, which Steve and I visited in ta snow blizzard, which closed in the sound but remained vast. We started each piece without any plan or form, but inevitably something familiar occasionally appears.

Thanks to Barry Witherden, Jazz critic and journalist for his enthusiasm, spirit and insights…

“an extraordinarily exciting unit which has become ever more organically bonded over the years”..

Catch the full review here:

http://www.jazzjournal.co.uk/jazz-latest-news/1426/

Welcome to the new site ! A very big thanks to the whizziness of Mat Short!

PINSKI ZOO’s recent gigs at the new venue in Nottingham (Peggy’s Skylight Nov 30) a couple of weeks ago and  for Derby Jazz (Baby People Club Dec 14) have lurched us into a weird direction. For these two gigs our original drummer Tim Bullock has taken over duties on the naughty chair. He toured and recorded on our first six albums and we are having fun playing some earlier material.

It was also great to see and meet up with another earlier original member, percussionist and guitarist Mick Nolan (now a great Gamelan afficianado!!)