Born October 27, 1975, in Novo Mesto, Slovenia, Igor Lumpert began his professional training at age 19 at the Bruckner Conservatory in Linz, Austria. During this period, he was a member of Munich-based band Sidewinders, winner of the“Best Jazz Group of Germany” award. After completing his studies with honors, Igor was invited by one of the world’s finest bassists, Reggie Workman, to study at the New School University in New York City. He received a scholarship and moved to New York in fall 2000. In April 2002, Igor was selected for the New School All-Star Wayne Shorter Ensemble, which performed at the “Beacons In Jazz” award ceremony at the Supper club, where Mr. Shorter was honored.  In 2011 Igor was commisioned to create a piece for a closure of European Capital of Culture. With multimedia artist Zeljka Blaksic he created Resistance of the Earth, a multimedia project that combines several artistic genres; from video, performance, 16 mm film to live music. The theme of the project covers the world of natural disasters like earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes and tornados. In addition to his work as a performer and composer, he has an active career as an educator, having taught master classes and improvisation lessons throughout Europe and the United States. His group, Innertextures, working since 2004 in different lienups, represents Igor’s passion for musical journeys to new and daring places – which was nicely proven by the quartet’s first tremendous gig at the Opus last year. Since then Eleven, their fourth album, was released in the spring, earning critical acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic: “Clarity, angularity, consistency are the most distinguishing characteristics of the album Eleven, created by saxophonist Igor Lumpert & Innertextures. M-Base, Mahler and Mingus are keywords, too. (...) Eleven is a regenerative, joyful work of complex music. Its bracing and encouraging power could help to face our world's chaos, with its juxtaposition of misery and joy.” Henning Bolte, All About Jazz“The post-bop tensions of the Big Apple, the obliquities of the folk melody, but also an original funk brilliance are the ingredients of a record that swarms with ideas and energy, not rarely explosive rhythmically under the oblique lines of the winds. Lovers of the most sophisticated urban-jazz, this record is for you!” Enrico Bettinelo, Giornale della musica“The musical formula remains the same, but now more matured and with other nuances: a kind of «hyper-mode bop» with funk elements and some aspects of Slovenian folk music” Blurb

The musical friendship of the two creative artists dates back more than a quarter of a century. Little Song, their first joint album was released in 1993, preceded by two years of intense creative work and numerous concerts. The debut was followed by three further common releases, as well as numerous domestic and foreign concerts. In the last twenty years, however, the career of the two musicians went separate ways. Károly Binder became the head of the Jazz Department of the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music and established BBMC, his own label. With his quartet and in duo with Mihály Borbély, he has a long series of successful concerts and albums behind him. Gábor Juhász is teaching at the Béla Bartók Conservatory and from 2018 is the professor for jazz guitar at the Music Academy. He has been a soloist in several groups, and runs his own different outfits since 2006. In March this year, after a long break of almost two decades, the duo resumed to play together. The occasion was a concert in the Benczúr House, a venue with a long jazz history, with the primary goal just to evoke old memories. However, it immediately became clear that the creativity of the two artists had lost nothing of their previous intensity in the past decades, so they decided to set the ship afloat again. On their Opus concert, both quarter-of-a-century-old and brand new compositions of the duo will be performed.

“The instinct for musicality is ever-present in the pianism of Béla Szakcsi Lakatos. A crafty instrumentalist, the pianist is an introvert and miniaturist, infusing conventional forms ... while still suggesting Satie-like refrains of dissonance, with an intimacy and an emotional intensity that can only be described as the poetry of feeling.” Raul da Gama, JazzdaGama One of the few Kossuth-Prize holders in jazz, 71-year-old pianist Béla Szakcsi is the emblematic, internationally renowned, outstanding figure of Hungarian jazz. Though invited mostly to perform in large venues, he is always happy to play at clubs-gigs as well. Especially when he does it in the good old trio line-up with such approved mates as Liszt-Price awarded drummer Imre Kőszegi and double-bass player György Orbán.

“Daniel Erdmann’s Velvet Revolution with French violinist extraordinaire Théo Ceccaldi and English percussion master Jim Hart (here solely on vibraphone) is a happy meeting of three kindred spirits and a tonal specialty. ...Velvet Revolution is a true European group with a strong spirit, wit, great musical ideas as well as fantasy and capacity to make it work in captivating ways.It’s not only the combination of instruments that is unique. The same applies to the playing. Fed by many sources, they act independently and together at the same time. They know what to play when, and how to arrive at a strong common theme, something that carries them along the predisposed into the imagined-in-the-moment. They are great at creating shifting atmospheres. It is heavy, then light again, firing at one moment and whispering the next.” Henning Bolte, All about jazz “...it is not only Erdmann’s concise compositions, specially designed for this trio, that give his band ‘Velvet Revolution’ a striking charism. Thanks to their individual virtuosity, Erdmann, Ceccaldi and the British vibraphone player Jim Hart might even have their own spark from children’s songs or famous chansons. Their joy of playing and close-knit interaction are a pleasure, the connection of high art, vitality and fine humor succeeds exemplary. Live on stage many improvisations shed new light to the pieces: the three of them balancing on the high ropes of the free, but never overbearing, imagination.” Norbert Krampf, FAZ After the huge German and international success of A Short Moment of Zero G, the trio's award-winning first album on BMC Records, they present their brand new material at the Opus, followed by a recording session of their second album at the BMC Studio.