In the United States, the trumpet is power. It leads jazz parades and bids farewell to fallen soldiers, plays in marching bands, mariachi groups, and on university campuses. Both John Williams and Duke Ellington wrote concertos for trumpet and orchestra; it also plays an important role in Charles Ives’ The Unanswered Question and Aaron Copland’s Quiet City. This instrument, associated with many traditions, has a much higher status in the New World than in Poland or other countries of the Old Continent. Hence the choice of repertoire for the album and the limitation to composers from the United States, as Aleksander Kobus, the originator and protagonist of the recording, pointed out in a conversation with me. (…)

The selection of only North American composers ensures a high level of coherence for the album, showing different facets of Neoclassicism and tonality in contemporary music. From the aforementioned classic Stevens, through representatives of the middle generation – Joseph Turrin, Bruce Broughton or Vizzutti and Ewazen – to the youngest in this group, Kevin McKee. All of them contribute to maintaining the continuity of the North American repertoire, which has long been an important point of reference for the Polish trumpeter and his wife.
Jan Topolski (transl. by Anna Marks)