AnimalMusic - JAZZ label

Animal Music is pleased to inform you that there are some recent additions to our catalogue - and more coming up!!!A great Czech double-bass player Tomáš Liška got together a very unusual ensemble, a trio of himself, an excellent guitarist David Dorůžka and ingenious Italian bandoneonist Daniele DiBonaventura. Together they recorded a very popular, touching debut album called “Invisible World“. The release party took place on December 9 and 10, 2009 at Prague’s Jazz Dock and was a huge success - the album consists of very soft, flowy Paris-like jazz.Liška’s Invisible World was followed by a CD release party of a Czech guitarist Libor Šmoldas, who recorded his new album “In New York on Time“ in New York together with Sam Yahel, George Mraz, and Jeff Ballard. There’s also a special guest, Zeurítia. For lovers of timeless classic, this album offers several tunes from My Fair Lady and also Šmoldas’s own compositions.Our newest addition is soon coming up - that is the debut album of a young quartet POINTS, which performs untypically without a harmonic instrument. They won, as the first Czech band ever, the first prize of the international jazz festival in Spain’s Getxo. The release party for POINTS CD is planned at Prague’s Jazz Dock on February 12 and 13, 2010. The POINTS are Luboš Soukup (tenorsax), Miroslav Hloucal (trumpet), Tomáš Hobzek (drums), and Tomáš Liška (double-bass).

There are also other great albums coming up - check back soon to read more about upcoming Vojtěch Procházka’s Trio CD (Adrian Myhr - double-bass and Tore Sandbakken - drums), or Cyrille Oswald’s CD with David Dorůžka (guitar), Daniel Šoltis (drums) and Tomáš Liška (double-bass)!!!

Tune in the good music..

The debut album of Czech band LANUGO was released and christened on June 7, 2009. Aside from jazz, there are many other influences and genres in this band’s projects. The band consists of singer Marketa Foukalova, pianist Viliam Beres, double-bass player Rastislav Uhrik, trumpeter Miroslav Hloucal, drummer Martin Kopriva and guitarist Mirek Smilauer. 

Another CD was published this summer - Jaromir Honzak’s LITTLE THINGS. The release party was held at Jaromir’s 50th birthday in August - and the musicians to be heard on this CD are David Doruzka, Michal Tokaj and Lukasz Zyta with a special guest, Chris Cheek. The concert took place in Palác Akropolis in Prague presented by a very special concert: altogether 7 ensembles played at the concert, including Jaromir’s own Quartet, than Quartet East (Kuba Stankiewicz, Piotr Baron, Jiří Slavíček), Face of the Bass (Michal Nejtek, Beata Hlavenková, Roman Vícha, Marcel Bárta),Bratři Ebenové, revived project “Čikori” with Iva Bittová, Vladimír Václavek, Miloš Dvořáček a František Kučera and couple other formations - what a celebration of great jazz music!

Finally, a debut album of Infinite Quintet SPEAK SLOWLY was released earlier in October 2009. The release party took place in Prague’s finest jazz club, Jazz Dock. Infinite Quintet is a band lead by trumpeter Miroslav Hloucal, alto and soprano saxophonist Petr Kalfus, pianist Viliam Beres, drummer Martin Novak and double-bass player Petr Dvorsky. Their music is contemplative, introspective, and deeply touching.All these three CDs are already available in our catalogue - Check them out!

After the two releases planned for April-June 2009 there are more albums to be released after the summer, that have just been recorded or will be recorded soon. Bassist and composer Jaromir Honzak has just recorded his fifth album with his Czech-Polish quartet featuring David Doruzka on guitar, Michal Tokaj on piano and Lukasz Zyta on drums, this time with a special guest - US saxophonist Chris Cheek. CD will be released in early September. Guitarist Libor Smoldas is just about to record his second album in NYC with All-Stars line-up - George Mraz on bass, Jeff Ballard on drums and Sam Yahel on piano! Bassist Tomas Liska will record his first album with David Doruzka on guitar and Daniele di Bonaventura (IT) on bandoneon in June. Infinite Quintet have recorded their debut album in March, it is going to be released in October. Last but not least - well known hammond player Ondrej Pivec will perform with special guests (Joel Frahm on tenor sax and Bucinatores Big Band) on 16 July in Prague and the show will be recorded for live CD/DVD to be released in 2010. Hope you will enjoy these tons of great music!

David Doruzka´s “Silently Dawning” was awarded as “Jazz Album of the year 2008″ by Czech Academy of popular music (Czech Grammy). Animal Music had one more nomination in this cathegory - Vertigo Quintet & Dorota Barova. After Jaromir Honzak´s jazz album of the year 2007 this is second award for Animal Music in two years of its existence!

Pianist Beata Hlavenkova´s CD “Joy For Joel” containing her own compositions, that was recorded in NYC and features Ingrid Jensen on trumpet, Rich Perry on tenor sax, Dave Easley on pedal steel, Mattt Clohesy on bass and Jon Wikan on drums has just been released! Beata toured Czech Republic in quartet wiith Ingrid, Jon and excellent Polish bassist Michal Barański in April 2009. Czech jazz-pop and experimenting group Lanugo will release their debut album in June 2009, containing 8 their own songs and At Last, well known standard performed by Etta James (among many others).