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Один из тех альбомов, которые нереиздаются в первую очередь и которые пользуются спросом у той части публики, которая на каких-то загадочных основаниях мнит себя «прогрессивной».

Позже Урбаняк уедет в Америку, и тамошняя его биография – тема для отдельного рассказа. «Саксофонист, играющий на скрипке», как он сам себя «позиционировал» - фигура в польском джазе нередкая, вспомните хотя бы Збигнева Сейферта, но с Майлсом Дэвисом играл только Урбаняк. Кстати сказать, его «американские» проекты мне лично не слишком нравятся – я больше люблю музыку с национальным колоритом, а в 1971 году у Михала Урбаняка его хватало. - А.К.

SUITE —JAZZ JAMBOREE 7O     21’12

(M. Urbaniak)

1.     NORTH  BALLAD

2.     EJ BLUES

3.     SPRING

GRAZY GIRL 7'OO

(K. Komeda, arr. M. Urbaniak)

BODY AND SOUL 5'3O

(Green, Heyman)

MICHAŁ URBANIAK - amplifled vlolin, soprano saxophone, tenor saxophone

baritone saxophone

ADAM MAKOWICZ   - piano, Hohner Clavinet

PAWEŁ JARZEBSKI - amplified bass

CZESŁAW BARTKOWSKI – drums

Live recording

at the Warsaw Philharmonic January 1971

"I'm a saxophonist who plays the violin", quipped Michal Urbaniak in an interview for the Down Beat. It seems the shortest identification for a musican who has hit the big time in the world of jazz. Always his man, he has shown a lot of iron will and preseverance on his way to the top. Besides being a notable player and composer, he is his own manager, producer and bandleader who has an uncanny ability in choosing young rookies and teaching them their way around the byways of jazz to launch their careers.

But back in the 60s he used to be just a sideman when he came on the jazz scene in his native Poland. As he put it: "After a long classical music training as a violinist, I took to the saxophone and started to play jazz".

He first recorded as Zbigniew Namyslowski's sideman with his group in 1963. In 1964 he joined the quartet of the legendary Krzysztof Komeda. Now he regards this as his major step in learning the jazz ropes. At the beginning of the 70s started his own bands. First with Adam Makowicz on piano, Pawel Jarzebski, bass and Czeslaw Bartkowski, drums.

The group gave a concert in the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall in January 1971 which was recorded live and later released as record No. 24 in the Polish Jazz Series. It might be of interest that the next record, entirely his own, was recorded live in the same hall in May 1973. This time, however, the group was joined by Urszula Dudziak, the scat singer, who was soon to become his wife. The Hammond organ was played by Wojciech Karolak, a jazz celebrity, whom Urbaniak took for his sideman later when he moved to the US. As the leader of the Constellation Band on that record Michal Urbaniak played the electric violin for the first time. Both the albums contain the best of his Polish period to give his fans a fine opportunity to catch the full flavour of this remarkable composer and instrumentalist on the threshold of his phenomenal career.

© Jan Borkowski (original line notes from Polskie Nagrania PNCD 032 CD reissue)

Michal Urbaniak has been a leading force of not only Polish but European (at least) jazz since 1970s. 

All elements of his artistic personality are already on this record: straight-ahead expression paired with Slavic ingenuousness, musical eclectics and influences of Polish folk music flawlessly incorporated into vocabulary of American jazz and an ear for contemporary articulation and instrumentation.

Since his beginnings as a collaborator in the bands of such leaders as Komeda and Namyslowski, Urbaniak has always been very sensitive to new trends in jazz music.  After becoming a leader of his own groups he has been able to find excellent partners to help him to fulfill his musical ideas and at the same time maintain their own originality.

In years after the release of “Live Recordings” his musical taste has not changed – he has continued his hunt after cutting edge styles, sounds, genres and technologies.  That perhaps explains always-moving focus of his artistic pursuits: from jazz-rock of 1970s to fusion and funk of 1980s to hip-hop of 1980/1990s.  But Urbaniak's explorations have never - to quote critic Kazimierz Czyz - "roamed outside of borders of art form".  

It would be impossible to find anybody else among Polish jazz musicians who has been able to reach so many people in the world with his music and that successfully position itself on world  jazz scene.  Michal Urbaniak found inspiration in his own folk tradition and created homogenous and very unique form of musical expression.  The one that has

© Chazz