Dear Opus Guests,We regret to inform you that the concert is cancelled due to the Hungarian border closures enacted by the Government on September 1. Tickets purchased online will be automatically refunded by InterTicket Kft. Tickets purchased on the spot may be refunded at the BMC Info Desk. Please check our website for further announcements. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate for your understanding.BMC – Opus Jazz Club "One of the most exciting things European jazz currently has to offer" – Jazzthetik Magazine In this second repertoire, the Franco-Belgian trio consisting of saxophonist Manuel Hermia, cellist Valentin Ceccaldi and drummer Sylvain Darrifourcq explores the sound that made them famous in Europe. The wild energy and great intensity communicated by the three musicians still contribute to a unique time-bound experience. Closer to a defined outline, their original process seems more and more clear. The energetic potential of instrumentation is used to its fullest: from a minimalist and noisy friction of the bow to a sound typhoon, the trio explores these extreme fields with the same eagerness. The new tones created by the sound objects of Sylvain Darrifourcq resonate perfectly with the creative cello of Valentin Ceccaldi: melodic, harmonic and percussive, all at once. Manuel Hermia exerts a powerful lyricism to this mechanical thread reaching a cathartic outburst.

In July 2017, the Ákos Fekecs Project was founded with the aim to realize Ákos’ own musical ideas with his friends and fellow-musicians. The drummer-composer has been working on his own compositions since 2011. His first independent work, Reverse, was seen by more than fifty thousand at the Drum Talk TV Video Store. In Fekecs’ compositions, we can find from soft jazz harmonies, through world music elements, pulsations of fusion and odd meters up to modern electronic sound. Beyond the composed material, the group’s way of playing is also reflected in energetic improvisations. In 2018, the Ákos Fekecs Project won the Laureate World-Jazz International Competition at the Amersfoort Jazz Festival in the Netherlands, but they performed with big success at many other foreign and domestic festivals as well, such as Jazz in the Park Festival in Cluj-Napoca, Babel Jazz Festival in Balatonboglár, the PulzArt Contemporary Art Festival in Sfântu Gheorghe, the Valley of Arts in Kapolcs, or the Budafok Champagne and Wine Festival. akosfekecs.com   Ákos Fekecs · Akos Fekecs Project (2018) www.akosfekecs.com

Treetop was created two years ago, while the musicians lived, played and studied together in Brno. The trio setting (accordion, trombone and double bass) is the result of a unique synergy and musical and personal understanding between three musicians from the Czech Republic and Slovakia. They inspire each other and the cooperation between the three "leaders" is very natural and fluid. Their diverse repertoire reflects many aspects of Treetop’s musical journey, spanning from jazz influences or folklore inspiration to contemporary musical concepts, enabling them to explore the unknown potential of this unusual instrumentation. "Members of the trio Treetop rightfully belong to most sought after young musicians in Czech Republic and Slovakia. Their extraordinary interpretation skills go well with challenging arrangements and novel compositions which excel thanks to their professional playing. All together creates a splendid sample for representing the artistic generation abroad” - wrote about the band Dagmar Ostřanská, director of Czech Center in Sofia, Bulgaria. triotreetop.com urbex sessions by Treetop

Grand compositions, crunchy rhythms, improvisations, lyrical images and a hint of sardonic wildness: János Bujdosó and his trio roam the soundscapes of underground jazz and world music with a style of their own that is best characterized as “Byzantine surf jazz”. The trio presents their recent release, National Amnesia Institute at Opus Jazz Club featuring Hungarian, Middle Eastern and Latin elements incorporated into repetitive musical structures.

Aram Shelton’s Hang Quartet plays creative jazz music inspired by Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy, and Charles Mingus. In this newly formed group, Shelton (USA) plays alto saxophone and is joined by some of the most dynamic voices of the Budapest jazz scene: Pozsár Máté, piano; Ajtai Péter, bass; and Kovács Zsolt Sárvári, drums. Since 2000, Aram Shelton has focused on creative music grounded in and influenced by the rich history of avant-jazz and free improvisation. He has a distinct, harmonically rich sound and develops musical thoughts through constant motion, tonal shifts and complex sounds alongside clear melodic and rhythmic constructs. He's been a member of the creative music communities in the San Francisco Bay Area, Chicago, Copenhagen and now lives in Budapest. The concert will feature Shelton’s compositions from his albums Everything for Somebody and Gold Age and will display each members distinct styles while making collective music that is joyful, energetic, raw and poignant.

"The world is full of rhythm, sound and vibration. The oxygen atoms sound in the major, the blades of grass sing, and everything around us is music" – this is the main idea behind Zoltán Lantos's OpenSource formation debut album, entitled Sonaris, published in 2018, in which the violinist and bandleader also incorporated his passion for the Eastern cultures. Mixing of modern jazz and Indian music, the sound of a traditional musical instrument called bulbul tarang and live electronics, post bop rhythms and bowl frills are natural and self-evident – thanks to Zoltán Lantos' travels in India, during which he gained an in-depth knowledge of this culture. In OpenSource’s music, the violin is heard in an electronic and groove-centric environment. All this is permeated by the meditative minimalism typical of oriental music, which invites the listener into a spiritual dimension. And the rhythm section – complete with a DJ and live electronics – makes this floating almost danceable. 

Szilvia Bognár, soloist in countless productions, is one of the most sought-after singers of Hungarian folk and world music. She appeared with famous artists like Márta Sebestyén, Andrea Rost or Ferenc Sebő, András Lovasi, András Berecz. So far, she has made six albums with her own compositions, ranging from Renaissance chants through children’s songs to progressive world music. On the repertoire of her new world music formation, the Szilvia Bognár Sextet, Hungarian, Gypsy, Bulgarian and Greek songs are played in an unconventional line-up and arrangement, as three worlds meet in the program – folk music, jazz and North Indian classical music. Preserving the essentially acoustic sound and the natural quality of traditional performance, they sail safely through a variety of different styles of music and traditional melodies.

Elliot Galvin is one of the stars of UK jazz. A superbly gifted composer and pianist, whose maverick imagination and magpie like ability to blend a disparate world of influences into his own unique musical vision has been compared to Django Bates although he sounds like no one except himself. Elliot is a prolific composer and has been commissioned by a number of Ensembles, Dance Companies, Theatre Groups and Festivals including the London Sinfonietta, Ligeti String Quartet, St. John Smith’s Square, The London Jazz festival, The RESOLUTION! Dance Festival at The Place and the Theatre Company Cut Tongues. He works regularly with multi-media and in 2014 put on a multi-media installation piece at the Turner Contemporary Gallery, which consisted of live performance, interactive sound sculptures and film. For four albums Elliot’s critically acclaimed trio with bassist Tom McCredie and sticksman Corrie Dick has been the main focus, with ​The Influencing Machine​ being named in both Downbeat’s and Jazzwise’s best of 2018 list. His next album, the brilliant ​Modern Times​ (a BBC 6 Music Album of theDay), continued this trajectory, but ​2020’s Live in Paris, At Fondation Louis Vuitton​, strips back his extensive arsenal of electronic and extended acoustic sounds, placing the brilliance of his pianism, musicianship and storytelling front and centre stage.

The avant-garde music program based on the poems of Lajos Kassák will be performed again in the Opus Jazz Club. Four musicians and one actor undertake to present the selected poems of Lajos Kassák at an unusual concert. The music of the artists faithfully follows the attitude of the works of the poet known for his free verses. Music compositions include melodic, song-like structured pieces, free improvisations following poems, and conceptual, avant-garde songs. The special feature of the project is that in addition to the actor László Keszég, the musicians also perform a poem, thus focusing on the personality and the experience of the poems. Veronika Harcsa doesn't cover poems for the first time, her 2011 album Lámpafény also included a Kassák adaptation, and she also selected most of the poems for this project. Albert Márkos is also known as a theatrical and film composer, many of the songs of the evening are named after him. Balázs Pándi and Róbert Benkő are the defining figures of Hungarian free jazz. The composition of the band is eclectic, the music they play matches Kassák's controversial personality and the diversity of the poems, the emotionality and hardness inherent in them.

On the second Tuesday of every month, members of the Modern Art Orchestra perform the compositions of a legendary jazz album at Opus Jazz Club. Interplay stands as some of Bill Evans' most enigmatic and unusual music in makeup as well as execution. It was recorded in July 1962 with a very young Freddie Hubbard from the Jazz Messengers, guitarist Jim Hall, bassist Percy Heath, and drummer Philly Joe Jones performing five veteran standards. Evans has a more blues-based approach to playing: harder, edgier, and in full flow, fueled in no small part by Hall, who is at his very best here, swinging hard whether it be a ballad or an uptempo number. Hubbard's playing, on the other hand, was never so restrained as it was here. Using a mute most of the time, his lyricism is revealed to jazz listeners for the first time – with Art Blakey it was a blistering attack of hard bop aggression. On this program of standards, however, Hubbard slips into them quite naturally without the burden of history – check his reading and improvisation on "When You Wish Upon a Star." Ironically, it's on the sole original, the title track, where the band in all its restrained, swinging power can be best heard, though the rest is striking finger-popping hard bop jazz, with stellar crystalline beauty in the ballads. (AllMusic Review by Thom Jurek)

On October 14, a quartet of international improvisers from four countries – Poland, the Czech Republic, Ukraine and Hungary – will be performed on the stage of the Opus Jazz Club. The lead musician of the project is the saxophonist Mikołaj Trzaska, an icon of Polish jazz. Composer, saxophone and bass clarinet player. He is the co-founder and saxophonist of the legendary Miłość. As a film composer he is also significant and he has collaborated with musicians such as Clemetine Gasser, Noël Akchoté, Peter Friis Nielsen, Paul Wirkus, Johannes Firsch, Peter Ole Jorgensen, Leszek Możdżer, Peter Brötzmann, Joe McPhee, Tomasz Stańko and Ken Vandermark.Hungary is represented by Balázs Pándi – who is well known on the world stages for noise, break core, doom metal and improvisational music. Amond others, he has collaborated with Merzbow, Venetian Snares, Zu, The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble, Mats Gustaffson, Keiji Hano. Representative of the Czech improvisation scene is Peter Vrba, a trumpet player, multi-instrumentalist, who has gained recognition in the field of free improvisation. He most often uses trumpets, clarinets, vibrating speakers, and various "objets trouvés". He is considered the most important musician in the Czech experimental music scene. He has worked with a number of notable artists such as Xavier Charles, Kai Fagaschinski, Chris Heenan, Christof Kurzmann. Ukraine is represented by double bassist Mark Tokar, a key figure in Ukrainian improvisational music. He is the first Ukrainian musician to have the opportunity to make his debut at the prestigious Chicago Jazz Festival in 2012. His first album, Yatoku (with Yuri Yaremczuk and Klaus Kugel), was released on Polish Not Two Records in 2006. Then Mark Tokar’s career suddenly curved upwards. He has been a permanent member of Ken Vandermark’s legendary Resonance Project since 2007.The opportunity for the artists to meet can be found in Polish Jazz / Neighbors (Polish Jazz / Sąsiedzi). project provided by the Firlej Cultural Center in Wrocław and the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, which promotes Polish culture abroad.

Set up originally as a trio in 2018, with saxophonist Balázs Raboczki, drummer Ambrus Richter and bass player Márk Miskolczi, the outfit has been adventuring from the beginning in the more form-breaking, creative territories of jazz, emphasizing soloistic playing. With the addition of trumpeter Bence Táborszky to the line-up several months later, the band deliberately continued keeping its distance from a musical environment provided by harmony instruments. From the beginning of this year, however, extended to a quintet by pianist Rezső Jónás, the group embeds their free and matured way of expression gained so far, to new, more tight and yet more spacious dimensions offered by the prospects of harmonies. “Our goal is to try to give the audience as much as we can about today's jazz and its directions and to express our respect for the past and present music at our concerts from as many sides and as fresh as possible” - says Balázs Raboczki about the band, which earned great praise at this year’s Müpa Budapest Jazz Showcase.

Arif Erdem Ocak is a Turkish percussion guitarist / songwriter, who connects centuries-old Turkish melodies with modern percussion-style guitar playing. With his storytelling and melodic guitar tunes that lean into folk, he intimately unfolds personal narratives and universal topics such as (after)life, spirituality, virtue and our common humanity. His songs, melodies, and lyrics cover a gamut of emotions; sometimes a mellow contemplation, sometimes overwhelmingly raw or sometimes melodramatic. Arif creates heartfelt hypnotic songs that get under your skin and takes the audience a journey of reflection, silence and mind fullness.Nasip Kismet is the first Turkish Psychedelic band of its kind, New-Anatolian. With its dense diverse background of music styles, history and experience from each of its members, the richness & depth of Nasip Kismets musical expression sings for itself.Sounds that stretch across the ages, telling a fusion of untold stories of the heart & soul. With Ancient Turkish roots strung to guitar, beats and bass demanding calls to attention towards the new worlds with saxophone, keyboards threading together the language we always once knew. We hear the grooves of time connected sending out the undeniable intoxicating vibrations of psychedelic transcendence.Attacca World Music members all come from different musical backgrounds. As a result, our music grows not only from the style, phraseology and the formal language of classical music and contemporary jazz, but also, very emphatically, draws inspiration from authentic folk music. We believe these influences make our sound more vivid, and function as cohesive force in our band. Our inspiration and guide is partly the folk music of the Carpathian Basin, particularly the pure source of Hungarian peasant music, which was extensively researched by Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, and partly the 20th century works of these two composers. Choreographed dance also appears in our music, accompanying some of our tracks. It represents different regional dances which have been part of our folk culture and traditions for centuries. 

Moment’s Notice is a rare encounter between three leading experimentalists from different corners of new music – jazz trombonist and stalwart of the Hungarian neo-avant-garde László Gőz, acclaimed electronic sound artist György Kurtág Jr., and cimbalom extraordinaire Miklós Lukács. Inspired by the Hungarian electronic classical music scene of the decades of state socialism (1960s-70s), the trio explores the spirit of the avant-garde and its relevance to today’s new music scene. The electronic sounds generated by György Kurtág Jr. give the framework for the music – or if we will, the basis – as if, sensitively reflecting his fellow musicians, he were constructing the form which two instruments dissimilar in sound and character, the cimbalom and the trombone, then proceed to fill with material. The difference in character is also due to the personalities of the performers. Miklós Lukács’s playing is imbued with frantic energy, which he is able to keep in check with dazzling mastery. László Gőz’s trombone playing, however, exudes a captivating calm, and even in the wildest of moments maintains its dignity. The personality of György Kurtág Jr. is partially concealed by the electronic sounds, and in all likelihood this is why Moment’s Notice Trio works perfectly: the three musicians complement one another not just musically, but also as people. The Trio's live album, Creation was recorded at the Liszt Academy of Music and released on BMC Records in 2019.

“Truly surprising…The top of their generation” – Jazzenzo “Absolutely current jazz, revealing both order and scale because Van Gelder thinks orchestrally” – Jazztimes “A breathtakingly talented guitarist, who is able to impress and touch with his instrument and a gifted composer who dares to take risk on top of this” – Jazzism Saxophonist Ben van Gelder (30) and guitarist Reinier Baas (34) have performed as a duo for almost a decade before recording their first studio album. Having tested the patience of their fan base for 9,5 bleak years, ‘Mokum In Hi-Fi’ will be released on September 13th 2019. Mokum is a slang term for the city of Amsterdam, used in endearment. It means city, place or safe haven, and stems from Bargoens: a language used by criminals, tramps and travelling salesmen. ‘Mokum In Hi-Fi’ is a tribute to the city that is home to both artists. A tribute, in particular, to the rough-around-the-edges, beer swilling, herring eating, jenever drinking, barrel-organ-wielding crowd centred around the Jordaan neighbourhood, that has come to define the city in the past centuries. (…) Baas and van Gelder have shared the stage over 200 times in the past years, in various settings: as a trio with drum legend Han Bennink, as soloists with the Metropole Orkest and as sidemen in each other’s quintets. They have toured Asia, Oceania and large parts of Europe. During this time, they have developed a vocabulary of their own: “heaviness alternated with nimbleness, strange chords with melodic clarity, unpredictability with a reassuring sense of overall form” (New York City Jazz Record).

Contrasts and dissonance, improvisation and diversity, joy and spleen, a contemporary sense of life and a grotesque, raw atmosphere, behind which some kind of charm and kindness flows. So much contrast reveals an organically evolving music in which elaborate forms and spontaneous moments alternate with the power of surprise. The Nagy Emma Quintet, founded in 2018 won the professional prize of the Müpa Jazz Showcase based on the votes of the international jury in 2019. Their first album, Set to Face, which features their own compositions, was also released this year. "On the material, the tension of the cacophony is always resolved by a bass or piano solo, or Emma’s soft, dream-waking voice" - wrote the Keret blog about the record. Their second album, LFO (Low Frequency Oscillator), recorded this summer, presents a clean music world that feels the tradition of twentieth-century jazz singing and the music world of today. Ballads, powerful throbbing, alternating rhythms, and loud solos suggests: all contradictions are natural. They will presents at the Opus Jazz Club their new album with a line-up in which Krisztián Oláh plays the piano and Dániel Mester on  saxophone. Photo: Kristóf Scholtz This concert is supported by the NKA Hangfoglaló Program.

NoSax NoClar remind us that travelling can still take us into the mystery of the unknown; that is something we should cherish. Julien Stella and Bastien Weeger extend our horizons outwards, through Julien Stella's boundless musical curiosity (Ireland, the Balkans, for example); but also inwards by letting the sound of breath bring us back into our own dreams. In this unusual combination of instruments, the two musicians have no alternative but to be continuously reinventing themselves, and to maintain the energy level needed to keep their breath going, while also exploring the rhythmic, harmonic and timbral possibilities. facebook AJC-Jazzé Croisé · No Sax No Clar - Sandman There is nothing like limitation and restriction to foster inventiveness. Taking short forms, always at a slow or medium tempo, the three musicians of the Kepler Trio, (Maxime Sanchez, piano, Adrien Sanchez, tenor sax, Julien Pontvianne, tenor sax and clarinet) set out to explore timbres, echoes, chimeras, and both natural and artificial resonance. And as they do so, their minimalist approach becomes poetic and reveals its depth. Ultimately the listener is led to focus where song and melody simply overwhelm the senses, and is taken right back to a lost paradise of innocence. facebook website AJC-Jazzé Croisé · Kepler - Juh The concert is being performed as part of the Jazz Migration series established by AJC to support the professional development of new jazz groups.

Nefertiti is about a passion for working on the form of compositions. This quartet of superb players was formed by pianist Delphine Deau in 2013, and her pieces have a compelling dramaturgy. The pulse and the melodic line only emerge after joyous free interchange, frolicking and shadowplay. Saxophonist Camille Maussion is a melodic player who is involved in ‘soundpainting,’ and also collaborates in the fields of dance, theatre and storytelling. He extends Deau’s concept and complements her lyrical playing in an ideal way. Drummer Pierre Demange also works in other art forms, notably the film and circus worlds. His mode of working with the wonderfully flexible Brazilian double bassist Pedro Ivo Ferreira often feels like they have together discovered the secret of perpetual motion. The concert is being performed as part of the Jazz Migration series established by AJC to support the professional development of new jazz groups.

East and West meet on guitarist Csaba Czirják's latest album, Sun and Moon, which he recorded with his new quintet. While in the pentatonic melodies we can discover the Hungarian folk music and Bartók heritage, the harmonies are typically western and typical of jazz. According to Csaba Czirják's own confession, this time he did not want to make a virtuoso jazz record, but a material whose melodies grab the listener attention. With the title of the record, which in some places has a meditative atmosphere, elsewhere it tends to fusion jazz-rock, it also indicates the direction of the music, insofar as it targets the universal, beyond the earthly, material qualities. On the third album of the formation, which follows the 2017 Markoláb and the Emma, ​​which was released in 2019, all this is helped by unusual instruments in jazz: the zither, which Csaba turns into a jazz instrument this time. In the absence of Áron Tálas, pianist Bence Molnár will take part in the record debut concert, as a new member, Dániel Mester will play in the band on saxophone, Ádám Bögöthy on bass and Tamás Czirják on drums. After completing the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music, guitarist Csaba Czirják studied at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Following his return to Hungary he soon became well-known by his versatility in different genres and lineups.

This young Swiss quartet was founded five years ago by trombonist Florian Weiss. Woodoism have been increasingly drawing the attention of international music critics and their growing fanbase in the past few years. The band, with Linus Amstad on altosax, Valentin v. Fischer on bass and Philipp Leibundgut on drums  released their highly recognised debut Woodoism in 2017 and were awarded the prestigous ZKB-Jazzprize as well as the audience award in 2018. Meanwhile, the band has been touring in Germany, Austria, Hungary, Italy, Russia and Lithuania. Their latest album was released on the german-based label Neuklang Future in autumn 2019: „A magic brew,“ as Jazzthing states in their review.

On the second Tuesday of every month, members of the Modern Art Orchestra perform the compositions of a legendary jazz album at Opus Jazz Club.

One of Hungary’s outstanding jazz guitarists, Bálint Gyémánt renewed his trio with young musicians. The guiding principles of the team’s collaborative work are freedom, experimentation, and exploration of new possibilities – each being a core part of jazz since the beginning. “The trio is my personal creative workshop where I can work with exceptional, inspiring artists who are also my friends. Although we perform my compositions, my partners always play a major role in creating the final sound. Each and every formation I play in I feel as my own, but the trio reflects my own musical language most accurately. Stretching the boundaries and finding new musical directions has always been important to me, which is why I wanted to create this fresh concept together with a new rhythm section”, says Bálint Gyémánt, working with Vince Bartók and Dániel Ferenc Szabó in his renewed trio. The young musicians are outstanding members of their generation who not only speak fluently the traditional language of jazz, but most modern trends have a major influence on their instrumental techniques as well. One of the special features of the trio’s sound is the the simultaneous presence of electronic and acoustic sounds of the drums. So while the band still remains a classical jazz trio, thanks to the technical equipment and effects their sonic colours became much more modern, allowing the musicians more creativity. According to Bálint Gyémánt, Pyramidion, the debut song of the trio, tells also about the state of mind behind the change: “For me, this song symbolizes faith in myself. It symbolizes that I should carry out my plans boldly. Vince Bartók and Dániel Ferenc Szabó are my true companions in this musical adventure. Whether it is a brand new composition or even rethinking of some of my earlier ones, I feel that our work moved to a completely different dimension.” The renewed repertoire includes also an arrangement of a traditional Hungarian folk song, connected to Bálint’s visit to the US last year. He left for Washington for just a single concert, where he performed in duo with Eden Ladin, the Israeli-born American pianist. He wanted to take something of his own musical roots with him to this journey, so he chose the well known folk song, Tavaszi szél vizet áraszt (Flood comes with spring winds). facebook.com/gyemantbalint