Letter from Vadim Neselovsky

VADIM NESELOVSKYI APRIL NEWSLETTER

NYC Show TOMORROW, Wednesday, April 27 at Kitano Jazz Club

Dear friends,

this winter and spring have been incredibly busy and eventful for me, and I’d like to share with you some of the things that have been happening in my musical life.

In December, I was fortunate to collaborate with one of my musical heroes — bassist, composer and producer Jimmy Haslip (of Yellow Jackets). Jimmy produced a recording of my composition “Last Snow” for Luba Mason’s upcoming CD “Mixtura”. Another legend, trumpeter Randy Brecker has played a beautiful solo on this track. Stay tuned for the release date of this record.

January 2016 has brought an amazing news from Korea —  a duo CD that we recorded with the singer BuYoung Lee (“Little Star”) was named Best Jazz CD by Korean Music Awards (KMA) 2016. Here’s a new solo piano video from a Korean TV show EBS.

In February I was honored to receive an invitation to open  Alfa Jazz Festival in Lviv, Ukraine (named one of the Top 10 European Jazz festivals by the Guardian) together with incredible youth symphony orchestra INSO Lviv on June 24th.  We had a chance to perform an hour of my orchestral music in 2015, and I can’t wait for another chance to share the stage with this great group. The orchestra is rehearsing the music already, and I am looking forward to a week-long preparation for the concert in June and the concert itself!

My affair with symphony orchestra that started in 2014 is continuing to evolve, which makes me extremely happy. Stellar conductor Gary Sheldon, who just conducted New York City Ballet Orchestra at Lincoln Center, has commissioned me to combine 3 of my existing scores and 2 more new movements (to be composed) into my SEASONS, which will result into 45-minute long piece for piano and orchestra. The premiere is scheduled for August 17th at Sandpoint Festival. Naturally, this is beyond exciting. More info will follow soon.

My trio “Agrucultural Dreams” with Israeli drummer Ronen Itzik and Saint Louis-born bassist Dan Loomis has been developing into a tight and intuitive group. We are going into final stages of production of our new recording, which will be released in the Fall 2016. This year also brought a new exciting collaboration: Portuguese singer Sara Serpa, known for collaborations with Danilo Perez, Ron Blake and Greg Osby is joining us regularly for our New York appearances.  She also sung two songs on the upcoming recording as a special guest. I am looking forward to take this trio on the road very soon. For those of you who are in New York, we are having a Trio feat. Sara Serpa show at Kitano Jazz Club on Wednesday, April 27th! 

Another great news arrived from MacDowell Colony, where I was fortunate to be a resident in 2012 and 2015. They notified me that I was selected to be Aaron Copland Fellow for 2015-2016.  Aaron Copland was a board member of MacDowell Colony and it is a great honor for me to be supported by Aaron Copland Fund for Music.

May will be a busy touring month for me. First, I am going to California to play 3 concerts plus some workshops for local students in the Bay Area. These will be solo/duo shows, and I am very excited to collaborate with an incredible bassist Jeff Denson. I was fortunate to be sideman in Jeff’s Quartet with Ralph Alessi and Dan Weiss, and we also played together with legendary Lee Konitz. These will be our first shows based on my original music.  

Just after returning from Oakland,CA to NYC (on the same day, in fact) I will take a plan to Switzerland, where our tour with Arcady Shilkloper will begin. We’ve been playing regularly with Arcady for the past 5 years, appearing in various parts of the world, and I can't wait to continue our musical journey. This time we will play 3 concerts in Switzerland and 2 in Germany before heading to Bauer Studios in Ludwigsburg (where Pat Metheny’s Bright Size Life was recorded) to record our second album for Neuklang Records.    

This spring will end with a solo piano concert at Jewish Community Center in Dortmund, Germany, where my Western life has started twenty years ago. 

Thank you very much for reading this. Wishing you all the best,


Vadim