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 The
intensive educational courses were established in September, 2006 as
a branch of Kiev International Jazz Seasons Project. Arcady Ovrutski,
the head of the Academy, developed the concept of it as "a chance
for Ukrainian young musicians to learn from the bearers of jazz culture,
to communicate, absorb knowledge and get practice in playing real jazz".
It should be said that the Academy is something unique for Ukraine,
since there are no similar projects here. The Academy is no ordinary
master-class but a series of jazz clinics. Academy students are led
through a row of theoretical stuff which is combined with numerous practical
classes at which learners work out a jazz program; as a result there
is carried out a Final Concert at the end of a course.
Frank Lacy, Steve Slagle, Gregory Porter, Kim Plainfield are among the
tutors.
Ukrainian mass media made very gratifying comments on the Jazz Intensives
that took place in September, 2006 and in December, 2006: "The
brass winds fill the air with an expressive polyphony, free-jazz tenor
saxophone floating over it. Now its sound descends to a hardly comprehended
hissing, then it hits your ears with high shrieking notes. All at once
everything ends, brass winds play some pumping up tunes, abound in long
pauses, and the music turns into a chaotic nervous vibration again...
Desperation, pain, insanity and hatred are interwoven in this crazy
dance. A powerful stuff. You can rarely hear something of the kind down
here, in Ukraine, - a collective improvisation is not that widespread
in our bands. That's been a great surprise from an Academy big-band
headed by frank Lacy."
(Ivan Condratov, UAjazz.Com)
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