Andrzej Jagodziński is one of the most outstanding figures on the Polish jazz scene, an excellent pianist, accordionist, composer and arranger. He has been a well-known and respected member of the music community for years. He gained fame and recognition as part of a trio featuring two other leading luminaries of Polish jazz (the brilliant double bass player Adam Cegielski and the legendary percussionist Czesław “Mały” Bartkowski, who began his musical career in Krzysztof Komeda’s band). Together, they concocted wonderful jazz interpretations of Chopin’s music. In the 2000s, Andrzej Jagodziński began to draw on the works of other Polish composers, including Krzysztof Komeda, Andrzej Kurylewicz, Jerzy Wasowski, and Jerzy “Duduś” Matuszkiewicz. He also found himself drawn to Polish folk music and the grander forms of classical music (including Chopin’s Sonata in B-flat Minor and selected movements from Beethoven’s symphonies).

With the trio at its core, Jagodziński began to experiment with an expanded line-up for his arrangements, including other instrumentalists, vocalists, and a chamber orchestra. Jagodziński’s most recent source of inspiration is the oeuvre of the master of polyphony himself – Johann Sebastian Bach.

Unlike in Chopin’s music, whose complex harmonies and refined melodies inspired improvisation, in Bach’s works the impulse for Jagodziński comes from its polyphony and the unlimited possibilities for individual parts to intercept and influence one another, as well as from the challenge of embedding this music in a jazz idiom. In December 2020, he released his album entitled Andrzej Jagodziński Trio – Bach.

The artist has composed several arrangements of Bach’s works for a larger ensemble: a jazz trio, an improvising female voice and an orchestra.

[text based on the materials provided by the performers themselves]