Marcel Barta - Marcel Barta: Episodes From The Spinning Ball [LP]

Saxophonist, clarinettist, composer and visual artist Marcel Barta entered the Czech jazz and improvisation scene while still astudent and has since become one of it's core members. He is a founding member of the electro-jazz quintet MUFF, the cult jazzsextet Vertigo and the duo DoMa Ensemble. Besides collaborating with many foremost artists from different genres on the homeand international scene, he has been dedicating himself to composition, writing scenic music for the theatre company Farma vjeskyni (Farm in the Cave), among otherprojects. He is the recipient of multiple Czech Music Academy Awards in the jazz category,having also been nominated for the same award on a number of occasions. While Episodes from the Spinning Ball is the firstrecording to feature Barta's work exclusively, the eponymous composition is his first piece for a large ensemble. As composerand arranger he has taken part in dozens of projects and recordings, many of which were released by the label Animal Music.The new album brings a recording of a concert performance featuring the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, which took placeas part of the jazz-symphonic crossover series New Horizons in February 2025 in the DOX+Multifunction Hall in Prague.Composed on a commission from the orchestra, the work formally resembles a suite in three parts. It is performed, however, asa continuous flow of music. In the author's own words, the piece "is an attempt to evoke a story that reflects my own planetaryexperience. The rotating ball in the title is a geoid, the shape of our own planet." Combining composed music with improvisation,the piece bears traces of Barta's original style, known for example from his work for Vertigo or Muff. It is rooted in jazz andcontemporary classical music and unfolds like an elaborate story in which densely composed soundscapes interweave withdelicate melodies and fine-grained instrumentation and whereorder coexists with improvisation and melancholy passagesalternate with psychedelia and humour. The jazz band in the recording features, alongside Marcel Barta himself, tromboniststepan Janousek, keyboardist and synth player Vojtech Prochazka, double bassist Milos Klapsteand drummer Jan Chalupa. Thewhole jazz-symphonic ensemble is conducted by Bastien Stil who has had ample experience leading crossover projects.