Juraj Stanik Trio - The Deep

The recording, The Deep. is anything but monochrome, as you can hear from the title track written by Jasper Blom, inspired by the film of the same name. Also Eddie Harris's 'Freedom jazz dance', which we know from Harris's own version with Cedar Walton on piano and the version by Miles Davis (with Herbie Hancock) on the celebrated extended bootleg version. With Juraj, it gains a masterfully controlled, contagious groove that's hard to get out of your mind.

When Juraj Stanik asks you to write something for the sleeve of his new recording, you certainly don't say 'no'. In my case, bolstered by years ofexperience of his work, from the outstanding group 'Five Up High' through to his trio CDs like 'Shaken not stirred', 'Wow' and 'Inside out'. It always was, and still remains, a great pleasure to listen to Juraj. His playfulness with musical forms, his unexpected, funny but always controlled fantasies and thatconsistent, unmissable swing with his colleagues on bass and drums, all following the same groove. Jazz that I always regarded as a sort of homecoming.