Mario Stanchev (piano) and Lionel Martin (saxophone) released their new music album entitled Jazz Before Jazz. It consists of jazz pieces based on motifs by Louis Moreau Gottschalk. The first official presentation of the album was held on March 3 in the French city of Lyon, one day before the CD appeared on the music market. Let us remind that Mario Stanchev is a Bulgarian musician who has been living for decades in Lyon, France. Lionel Martin partners Mario in various jazz formations. The renowned musicians took part at Stara Zagora Jazz Festival as well.

Louis Moreau Gottschalk is an American composer who lived and worked in the Romantic Period. He was born in New Orleans in 1829. He left the USA when he was only thirteen years-old and sailed to Europe to study music there. Although the Paris Conservatoire rejected his application on the grounds of his nationality, he attended private lessons held by renowned music pedagogues. Louis Moreau Gottschalk made his music debut in the French capital when he turned sixteen and between 1840 and 1850 he held a series of piano concerts in Switzerland, Spain and France. He created mainly pieces for piano for the so-called salon music. Here is what Mario Stanchev told Radio Bulgaria about his first true meeting with Gottschalk's music:

“My friend Jean-Noël Régnier who is a director of a large concert hall in Lyon is a real music encyclopedia. Some time ago he told me that some of my pieces reminded him of Gottschalk's music style. I had heard of this author before, but I knew little about him and his music. Jean-Noël gave me some Gottschalk's music and a book with the memoirs of the renowned composer himself.  I was grabbed by the interesting music and the unusual biography of an extremely interesting personality. I decided to ask Lionel to play some of Gottschalk's pieces together. Gottschalk used to travel a lot in the Caribbean region, South America. His music consists of different music influences. For instance, he used elements of Spanish music. He foresaw a lot in jazz music. For example, Gottschalk influenced with his pieces the Ragtime (the music style that preceded jazz). We mainly focused on Caribbean intonations and rhythms, as well as on his music heritage from his native city of New Orleans, also known as the cradle of jazz. Gottschalk was an extraordinary and very talented man, yet he was involved in some scandals and was forced to leave the USA due to an affair with a local woman. He knew kings and emperors and often played piano pieces for them. Meanwhile he held concerts on incredible places such as the Land Of Fire Archipelago. He used to carry his piano onboard the ship he travelled with and held concerts to the local Indians. He wrote in his memoirs details about the morals and the customs of these people just like a real anthropologist.”

“People show huge interest towards our new music album and it was assessed positively even before it was officially released. We have been working over this program for two years and so far we held several pre-premiere concerts where we presented some of the pieces in our new album. We can't say that it is Gottschalk's music. Our approach rather resembles the jazz standards - tunes written by composers (who often have nothing to do with jazz), interpreted by every jazzman in a different manner. We used some interesting melodies and some of Gottschalk's music forms, yet we interpreted them our own way using our contemporary sense of music and our own music potential. It is not easy to attract peoples' attention amidst the great variety of CDs and music projects. However, our project Jazz Before Jazz immediately attracted the interest of the music fans and we were invited to hold a series of concerts.”

The audio features the following pieces:

1- Manchega

2 - Cuban Romance 

3-  Banana Tree

English version: Kostadin Atanasov