Janusz Muniak

Lobagola

On the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the existence of the unusual club ''U Muniaka'', which Urszula Dudziak once called a ''gem'', and about which one of the regulars said apart from the Dragon's Den, ''only here is dragony'', Polskie Wydawnictwo Muzyczne decided to celebrate this anniversary by publishing a Muniak composition notebook. But even without this anniversary, the set would still have appeared: Janusz's compositional achievements to date, distributed on nine solo discs, remain little known, and yet are very valuable. As Polish jazz musicians have a mind-boggling unwillingness to perform songs composed by their friends (there is one exception: Krzysztof Komeda's music, most recently very ''trendy'' in Poland), it's time to break this bad tradition: here you have a choice before you of eight songs by the Master and nothing need stop you from including them in your toolbox! [Krystian Brodacki]