Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Ljubljana / Klub Cankarjevega doma / Slovenia
Concert date: 10.05.2016
Attendance: 120
Uroš Rakovec and Marko Brdnik hardly need a big introduction. Two hugely experienced musicians with layered, multi-genre chops (really, the word “genre” is an outright limitation for them) found a shared creative language, teamed up as a duo and made their studio debut. It’s called »Leta« and came out in mid-April this year, backed jointly by the labels Pivec and ZARŠ. Accordion and guitar, then. Nothing less, nothing more. Music with provocative substance, everyday yet never ordinary. It sounds homey, but with the artistic flourishes of a one-of-a-kind, homegrown vision, it keeps teasing you all the same. Like a cleverly bewitched riddle.
After a string of gigs, fate brought the duo to Cankarjev dom too, where Marko and Uroš used the show for an in-depth presentation of the album »Leta«. The cream of the crop of acquaintances, friends, supporters and, of course, “casual” music-curious types packed out the club space at Cankarjev dom well and good when the two lads strolled onto the stage at quarter past eight in the evening and kicked off their set.
They shuffled the songs in the set according to the running order on the record »Leta«. They opened with the album’s title track, followed by a cover of Ennio Morricone (if I caught it right, it was one of the pieces from the Cinema Paradiso soundtrack), then the gentle, tender Voda, then Esbjörn, in which the duo paid tribute to the Swedish jazz pianist Esbjörn Svensson, and so on… The duo also played a brand-new song, Sam, which hints that »Leta« isn’t just one more stop on their shared musical road, but that a follow-up may well be in the cards.
At the gig, Brdnik and Rakovec proved they pick up on each other extraordinarily well, with the kind of chemistry you get when a bond has been warmed up to the right working temperature. The result was a homegrown, provocative blend of rich world-music vistas, deftly sprinkled with neoclassical tunes, into which the two masters tossed solo seasoning of daringly experimental jazz flourishes at will, and in their back-and-forth they came across totally “level”. So neither instrument hogged the spotlight in this musical story.
The lads also spiced up the show with colorful stories behind the songs and how they came about, and with a playful, charmingly sly sense of humor they kept the mood light and fun throughout. No need to stress that they cast a spell over the crowd with their finesse and deep sensuality as they worked through the set. After thunderous applause, the audience called the duo back for just one more number (Dom De Iludir, orig. C. Veloso), since the lads don’t have any more pieces ready for a live set just yet. And yes, the album »Leta« is an exceptionally special record. Adventurous and exploratory in spirit. It melts elements of the world’s musical heritage, with no limits, into an eclectic mix, a one-of-a-kind picture book of an extraordinary symbiotic weave of two instruments. Guitar and accordion.
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