For the eighth time Ternopil joined the International Jazz Festival Jazz Bez. It took place in 16 Ukrainian and Polish cities: Lviv, Lutsk, Kyiv, Kharkiv, Ternopil, Cherkasy, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lublin, and others. Director of the festival in Ternopil Oleh Makohin noted that the popularity of jazz musicians was not the main factor for selecting them to participate in the Jazz Bez. At the festival the audience could listen to musicians with different levels of popularity, but all of them without any doubt were very talented. “Jazz performed by less-known bands is interesting due to the fact that these musicians are experimenting with more genres and various instruments,” said Taras HUMEN, connoisseur of such art phenomenon. “I am always pleased to see musicians who impress with their innovative approach – they improvise with tempo, combine jazz with ethnic tunes and classics. Improvisation is the main thing in jazz!”
Vinita Formation band closed this year’s Jazz Festival in Ternopil. Among the band musicians there is one Canadian guitarist of Ukrainian origin Alex Maksymiv. This band participates in many festivals, has concerts in different countries. Music critics highly rate the musical potential of Vinita Formation. By the way, one of the most progressive saxophonists from New York Marcus Strickland plays in this band. Early next year the band plans to release their new album.
In 12 years (festival has been conducted in Ukraine for that long) Jazz Bez gave impetus to the development of a whole new layer of youth music culture. For example, in Ternopil there appeared many bands, that are experimenting with music. They learned this from the jazz, music that they heard performed by artists from different countries during festival concerts. “Each year we try to invite bands that haven’t been to Ternopil yet. On the first day of the festival Polish band Daktari and Swiss band Plaistow gave their performance. This was the first time those bands came to Ukraine. On the last day the audience listened to the performance of the Polish band and a band from New York and Chicago. Both of these bands also performed for the first time in Ukraine,” stressed the organizers of the festival.
“Jazz became the music of intellectuals, people capable of thinking, for whom pop music is only the music of primary instincts,” said the director of the festival in Ternopil Oleh Makohin.
