Award-winning piano-sax duo Euan Stevenson and Konrad Wiszniewski explore the relationship between classical music and jazz
In this superb, informal presentation, two of the UK’s leading jazz musicians improvise a Bach-style reinvention and an arrangement of the Duke Ellington Orchestra’s theme tune, Take the A Train in the style of a Mozart Sonata, among other delights.
As well as being a superb pianist, Stevenson is a composer who has premiered works on both sides of the Atlantic and whose most recent commission was an arrangement of the Ukrainian national anthem for renowned violin virtuoso Pinchas Zukerman and the English Chamber Orchestra. Wiszniewski is one of the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra’s star soloists and twice winner of the Best Instrumentalist title at the Scottish Jazz Awards.
As they move between musical styles with consummate ease, you discover why romantic composers like Chopin, Rachmaninov and Duke Ellington all loved the same key. Learn why Miles Davis and Eric Satie were kindred spirits and hear brilliantly performed jazz standards and original compositions from the two albums by Stevenson and Wiszniewski’s widely acclaimed group, New Focus.
In awarding The Classical Connection at Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival in 2019 five stars, The Herald’s Keith Bruce praised Stevenson and Wiszniewski as 'musicians with an instinctive desire to communicate.......The audience went home royally entertained, and probably a little better educated as well.”