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  | RATKO ZJACA ~ TOUCHING MINDS IN+OUT 77161 (Barcode: 798747716123) ~ CROATIA ~ Jazz-World Fusion Recorded: 2024 Released: 2025
This is an album by Croatian (resident in Netherlands) Jazz guitarist / composer Ratko ZjacaFind albums by this artist, recorded in a quartet setting with Romanian cimbalom player / pianist Marius PredaFind albums by this artist, British (also resident in Netherlands) bassist Nick McGuireFind albums by this artist and Indian Master percussionist Trilok GurtuFind albums by this artist. The album presents eight tracks, all of which are original compositions by Zjaca, and all were arranged by Preda.
The music offers a distinct World music character and highly unusual aural environment created by the cimbalom, which is hardly ever heard in the Jazz environment, the exotic percussion by Gurtu and Zjaca’s guitar improvisations, which also use rather unusual registers. This leaves McGuire to serve as the only steady / solid / immediately recognizable foundation, which keeps the music on the “familiar” track and tempo. As a result, this album definitely requires a very liberal and open-minded approach from the listeners, who might need to “reconfigure” their musical orientation in order to engulf themselves with these wondrous sound vistas.
I have known Zjaca and his music for quite a while and always admired him for his ambition to innovate and change his musical environments, but this is probably his most dramatic venture / adventure so far. Of course he takes risks by playing unconventional music, as all brave Artist do, and deserves all the due respect. I hope his listeners will be able to embrace these new explorations, as they are certainly highly rewarding. This multi-cultural collage of colors and sounds prove to be most rewarding, if not at the first contact, surely as a result of further investigation.
Overall, this is a most surprising, overwhelming album, which takes no prisoners and transports the listener into an amalgam of multi-cultural Jazz-World Fusion music, via a magic carpet ride between the Balkans and India. It takes a while to absorb the somewhat radical approach, but once the adventure begins, it is quite unstoppable. Hats off my Friend, and I hope this music will speak to many of your faithful listeners!
| Updated: 17/09/2025Posted: 17/09/2025 | CD 1 Mini-Sleeve Recommend To A Friend |
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