It's Time To Find New Aesthetics In The Salihara Jazz Buzz 2023, This Time With The Exchange Theme

JAKARTA - One of the flagship programs that received great response and attention from the public regarding the Salihara Arts Center Community is the Salihara Jazz Buzz; an annual jazz festival featuring options for genres, compositions and presentations of new musical concepts.

Reflecting on the success of the 2022 Buzz Salihara Jazz event, this event will be back in February with the musicians of the choice of open invitation results in the middle of last year.

Since 2016, Salihara Jazz Buzz has always carried the big idea of Jazz Sans Fronti Emberes, a cross-border' musical idea and concept. This makes Salihara Jazz Buzz one of the most popular shows for Salihara Community art audiences.

This Exchange/Exchange theme is clear evidence that the Salihara Jazz Buzz wants to showcase the nature of jazz that is able to explore into other music genres.

Salihara Community Music and Dance Curator Tony Prabowo said the Exchange theme could present a new concept in the community of Jazz music connoisseurs.

"As an organizer of an art party, of course the hope is that it can provide fresh, quality, freedom of expression and offer the concepts of renewal for the public who are interested in music and art as wide as possible, in the midst of many jazz festivals in this country," said Tony Prabowo in his official statement.

The results of the Open Call present three groups of the best musicians according to the team of curators Salihara. The three musicians are Eligung Cahyadi, Guernica Quartet, and Sandikala Ensemble who come with their respective aesthetics in presenting new nuances of jazz music.

The year 2023 marks the new sign for Salihara Jazz Buzz after the pandemic period is gradually over. This year, we will watch jazz performances through the experience that is appropriate, namely live on February 4, 5, and 11 at the Salihara Theater.

In addition to showing their original works, these three selected musicians will also collaborate with senior musicians to perform performances that can only be watched at the 2023 Buzz Jazz Salihara.

The first performer is Sandikala Ensemble (SE). The group from Yogyakarta with artistic director Dion Nataraja is a group with a format that uses gamelan instruments a lot.

Dion Nataraja, an artistic composer and director of SE who is currently completing his doctoral program at the University of California, offers a deeper concept of improvising gamelan and jazz.

SE is not just mixing gamelan instruments and other instruments commonly used in jazz, but looking for deeper common ground, for example exploring the concept of pathetan in a more free improvisation gamelan. In this Buzz Jazz, SE had the opportunity to collaborate with senior musician Sri Hanuraga in the work of Hyperdevelopment III and Improvision I.

Next is the Cahyadi Project (FCP) which is a group with a quintet format. As an artistic director of FCP, Ignos Cahyadi uses the concept of an odd count pattern in his composition. This quintet presents Restha Wirananda (piano), Arini Kumara (selo), Cuba Skowronski (flute & tenor saxophone), Ferdinand Chandra (contrabas & electric bas), Gett Cahyadi (drums) and senior musician Indra Perkasa who will collaborate with FCP.

Finally, there is Guernica Quartet (GQ) who became the musician for the closing of Salihara Jazz Buzz 2023. Guernica Quartet is a group that represents her work through the mix of various musical and instrumental genres. They try to explore voices and various other types of music such as traditional Japanese music, India, Middle Eastern music and Armenian music and sequencer who voice elements of 'ethnic' voices. In this appearance, Guernica Quartet will also collaborate with senior jazz musician Adra Karim.

The Salihara Jazz Buzz show is supported by VOI.ID and is open to the public. To watch it, visitors can immediately order via tiket.saliara.org at a price of IDR 75 thousand (adults) and IDR 50 thousand (students/students).