Article of Mihály Czékus in HangzásVilág Magazin Hungary, Aug/2021

Arti­cle of Mihá­ly Czé­kus in Hang­zás­Világ Maga­zin Hun­ga­ry, Aug/2021

Alto, sopra­no and tenor saxo­pho­nist and com­po­ser Muri­el Gross­mann, can be cal­led a real world citi­zen. She was born in Paris but grew up in Vien­na and has lived in Ibi­za for more than a deca­de and a half. She stu­di­ed clas­si­cal flu­te in the Aus­tri­an capi­tal from the age of five to the age of twen­ty-one, and later swit­ched to the saxo­pho­ne. Muri­el is a gre­at admi­rer and fol­lower of the work of John Col­tra­ne. A few years ago, she also gave a very suc­cess­ful con­cert in Buda­pest. We are now pre­sen­ting two of the artist’s albums. A spe­cial fea­ture of the­se is that in addi­ti­on to the CD, they are also avail­ab­le on vinyl.

Muri­el Gross­mann made her “Gol­den Rule” album with her band, which was foun­ded in 2014 and still works today. The music team is a real inter­na­tio­nal for­ma­ti­on, with Ser­bi­an Rado­mir Milo­j­ko­vic play­ing gui­tar, Aus­tri­an Gina Schwarz on bass and Ser­bi­an Uros Sta­men­ko­vic on drums.

The album pro­ves well that Gross­mann not only sim­ply lis­tened to Col­tra­ne a lot, but also unders­tood the late musician’s mes­sa­ge. — Through her own com­po­si­ti­ons — the true beau­ty, hones­ty and joy of Coltrane’s musi­cal thoughts live on while mas­ter­ful­ly dis­play­ing her own crea­ti­ve ide­as. This album is a rich repo­si­to­ry of new ide­as, a pro­duc­tion of cha­rac­ter and spe­cial plea­su­re to the listener’s ears. Gross­mann is noto­rious­ly a big sup­por­ter of the so-cal­led spell game. Accord­in­gly, more than half of the 7 com­po­si­ti­on reper­toire con­sists of record­ings lon­ger than 11 minu­tes of play­ing time. Out­stan­ding among them is the near­ly 19-minu­te “Tran­eing In”. For tho­se who love rich, breath­ta­king works that encou­ra­ge the soul to soar free­ly, this album is a real treat.

Gol­den Rule con­veys medi­ta­ti­ve calm and ecsta­tic joy. Gross­mann shows what melo­dies she can bring out of her instru­ment, play­ing a lyri­cal solo that seems like a dis­creet com­po­si­ti­on in every bar. The dyna­mism of the soloists and the tele­ki­ne­tic per­for­mance of the quar­tet accom­plish the goal of the album: it evo­kes a sta­te simi­lar to trans­cen­dence from its audience.
Fea­turing: Muri­el Gross­mann — sopra­no and tenor saxo­pho­ne, Rado­mir Milo­j­ko­vic — gui­tar, Gina Schwarz — dou­ble bass, Uros Sta­men­ko­vic — drums.

A new musi­ci­an will also make his debut on Muri­el Grossmann’s album “Quiet Earth”. Llo­renç Bar­ce­lo, who plays the Ham­mond organ from Mal­lor­ca, doesn’t take the place of one of the old musi­ci­ans, but expands the band.

This pla­te is shor­ter in size than usu­al from Gross­mann. Only four songs are on this album with a show­time of about 40 minu­tes, all of the saxophonist’s own com­po­si­ti­ons. In a well-trace­ab­le way, Gross­mann draws a lot of inspi­ra­ti­on from John Col­tra­ne in this pro­duc­tion as well. Well, for me per­so­nal­ly, the music of a saxo­pho­ne always evo­kes the most posi­ti­ve emo­ti­ons. This disc is no excep­ti­on. “Wien” ope­ning the album is the only one that can be cal­led clas­si­cal (in the jazz sen­se). We need to think main­ly about the struc­tu­re of the com­po­si­ti­on, whe­re after a solo with the saxo­pho­nist, Milojkovic’s gui­tar, then Barcelo’s organ, and final­ly Grossmann’s saxo­pho­ne come to the fore again. In the world of thought of the com­po­si­ti­on, the pul­sa­ting, modern Aus­tri­an capi­tal appears more than in the time of the impe­ri­al Vien­na anno Franz Joseph.

The com­po­si­ti­on “Afri­can Call” can also be seen as a kind of refe­rence to the artist’s pre­vious album, “Rever­ence”. At the very least, it is clo­se­ly rela­ted to the vivid saxo­pho­ne colors and the vary­ing ante­ce­dents of Afri­can motifs that give the rhythm sec­tion a pro­mi­nent role. The impres­si­on is emer­ging that Afri­can Call just didn’t have a place on that album, but it works well here. The second half of the album seems like a kind of creed. In the form of “Peace­ful River” and “Quiet Earth,” Muri­el Grossmann’s dreams of how our pla­net should look (see her wis­hes on the album notes) appear.

Ever­yo­ne wants to use their own means to draw atten­ti­on to the dan­gers lur­king on our pla­net. The impor­t­ance of sus­tainab­le deve­lo­p­ment. What can a musi­ci­an do about this? SHe com­po­ses music and fills his/her works with such thought­ful­ness that it is deeply ing­rai­ned in the listener’s memo­ry. Fea­turing: Muri­el Gross­mann — sopra­no alto and tenor saxo­pho­ne, Rado­mir Milo­j­ko­vic — gui­tar, Gina Schwarz — dou­ble bass, Uros Sta­men­ko­vic — drums, Llo­renç Bar­ce­lo — Ham­mond organ

Mihá­ly Czé­kus in Hang­zás­Világ Maga­zin Hun­ga­ry, Aug/2021

 

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