George Mraz & Emil Viklicky - Together Again (CD)

Release Date: 02/28/14

Mraz and Viklický - two of the leading Czech jazz musicians - perform a new Czech way of jazz, fresh ideas on traditional foundations.

George Mraz and Emil Viklický – two of the leading Czech jazz musicians back together again: The former is one of the best-known bassists worldwide and built a career in the States. He has credits on almost 1,000 records and CDs. There is as good as no big name in jazz that he hasn’t made music with. The Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, Stan Getz, Tommy Flanagan and Richie Beirach were his most important regular partners. “George plays the bass like he invented it. He always plays exactly the note you want to hear,” said pianist Beirach about him once. Viklický is less well known internationally than his countryman, but no less significant: He is the “patriarch of Czech jazz piano” (London Evening Standard) and “one of the best contemporary pianists, whose touch, voicing and chords have a lot in common with the grand masters of taste the likes of Tommy Flanagan and Jimmy Rowles,” wrote the American JazzTimes of him. Like Mraz, Viklický studied at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, but then returned to his homeland, unlike his colleague. What unites the two is their love of Moravian folk music and the idea of transferring it into jazz. With the two albums “Morava” (2002) and “Moravian Gems” (2007), Mraz and Viklický made this idea a reality. Two outstanding recordings that have somehow never found their way to a broad audience. But this captivating, imaginative music played by two extraordinary musicians is simply too good to fade into oblivion, thought producer Siggi Loch to himself, and decided to reunite them and reanimate the old idea in an intimate dialogue. The result: A new Czech form of jazz, fresh ideas founded on traditions. And not least of all two of the most remarkable voices of jazz can be discovered on “Together Again”.