Silk Road Klaus Paier & Asja Valcic

• 1 Ayer 04:23
• 2 Just a Day 04:39
• 3 Silk Road 07:46
• 4 Song Is Blue 04:28
• 5 Waltz for Mama 04:58
• 6 Whirlwind 04:18
• 7 Night Walk 04:37
• 8 Troubadour 03:37
• 9 Stirring Summer Storm 03:40
• 10 Celtango 04:23
• 11 How Roses Are 04:24
• Total Runtime 51:13

Info for Silk Road

Paier and Valcic’s music is daring and full of curiosity, they present us with a road movie beyond convention that is full of layers and colours. “Silk Road” still maintains a unique and homogenous sound created by two adventurous explorers, who both fully master their instruments whilst complementing each other perfectly.

Like so often, it took a long time to form something that nowadays seems destined to be together. It began twelve years ago, when Austrian accordionist Klaus Paier assembled a string quartet for one of his projects, and these four went on to become the radio.string.quartet.vienna. After their sensational debut album “Celebrating the Mahavishnu Orchestra“ they worked together with Klaus Paier on their next album “Radiotree” and it did not go unnoticed how well Asja Valcic’s cello suited Paier’s accordion. It was the beginning of a co-operation - “A Deux”, which, according to the SPIEGEL, combined “spectacular bitter-sweet sounds of an accordion with a cello that can groove like an upright bass” into “the very best of euro jazz”. Both audience and critics were sold, and the accolades followed, such as the “CD of the month” in Audio and Fono Forum.

The duo’s music is daring and full of curiosity. In search of the perfect sound of an accordion and bandoneon, Klaus Paier has developed an absolutely unique technique of his own (on instruments built especially for him) that allows his instrument to breathe and gives him an unrivalled stylistic as well as improvisatory freedom. Various influences are noticeable: tango, bal-musette, Balkan, jazz. Paier appreciates the accordion tradition: “For me the roots are like a main street, on which I don’t want to stay too long. That is why I take a quick and spontaneous turn.”

For Asja Valcic it was not always easy to follow him on these roads, although she mastered all playing techniques of the cello. “I had not been improvising that much until then.” After four years of working together and hundreds of concerts this is no longer the case. “It was time to make a sequel for “A Deux.” The result is called “Silk Road” and it is not just any record, but rather the convincing result of a harmonious and intense co-operation of two adventurous explorers, who both fully master their instruments as well as complement each other perfectly.

The growth of the project can also be measured on the fact that Asja Valcic has composed three of the eleven pieces. Although she has experience in composing, compared to the professional composer Paier she is a novice in this field. “As a matter of fact, ‘Waltz For Mama’ is the second piece that I have ever composed. Actually it has lyrics, but Klaus has made a perfect instrumental arrangement of it,” she explains. Therefore, “Silk Road” has even more layers, colours and energy. It has South American (e.g. “Celtango) as well as South and East European sounds (e.g. “Ayer”), peaceful ballads, cheerful blues songs (“Song is Blue”) and rhythmic up-tempo pieces, such as Paier’s “Whirlwind“ or Valcic’s “Stirring Summer Storm“ that live up to their names.

Nevertheless, “Silk Road“ has a unique and homogenous sound. The title song demonstrates Paier’s ability to introduce and transform musical themes: the bandeneon theme appears from a distance, builds up and becomes loaded with energy through elaborate pauses and rubatos. Equally masterful is the final piece “How Roses Are” that Paier has dedicated to his American colleague, accompanist and longstanding friend Frank Marocco, who died in March. However, it is an optimistic, even a cheerful song – a jazz farewell from Austria to Chicago in the New Orleans tradition.

Paier will continue creating new sounds as a solo artist as well in various assembles – Valcic will carry on with the revolutionary radio.string.quartet.vienna and will soon appear in a trio with her ACT colleagues and masters of improvisation Iiro Rantala and Adam Baldych. But time and again these two kindred spirits will come together and compose further musical road movies beyond conventional ways.

Klaus Paier, accordion, bandoneon
Asja Valcic, cello

Recorded and mixed by Christoph Burgstaller, Vienna, June 2012
Mastered by Klaus Scheuermann

Asja Valcic
She studied with V. Despalj (Zagreb/Croatia), L. Terraspulsky (Massachusetts/USA), N. Schahovskaja (Moscow/Russia) and K. Georgian (Detmold, Germany). Graduation with Soloist's Diploma. She attended master classes with B. Pergamenchikov and B. Greenhouse. She has played chamber music with G. Schulz (Alban Berg Quartett), H. Schoneweg (Cherubini Quartett), I. Bolton (Brodsky Quartett), I. Bieler (Melos Quartett), A. Engegard (Orlando Quartett), T. Brandis (Brandis Quartett), and many others. As a soloist she performed with the Zagreb Philharmonic, Belgrade Philharmonic and the Westfälische Kammerorchester, conducted by the likes of Kazushi Ono and Zubin Mehta. In 1995 she won the “Concours international de jeunes concertistes de Douai" in France. She recorded Sonatas of Shostakovich and Schnittke for Jugoton (1989) and Serenads of Martinu for d+g (German Record Critics' Award in 1998). Valcic was teaching at the music academy of Zagreb (Croatia), at the Dartington International School of Music/England, in Chioggia/Italy and at the university of music Detmold/Germany.Since 2008 she is playing in duo with Klaus Paier. She is a cellist of radio.string.quartet.vienna since 2004.

Klaus Paier
studied accordion, jazz and composition at Klagenfurt conservatory. Paier has been particularly inspired by such instrumentalists as Keith Jarrett, Bill Evans, Charles Mingus or Thelonious Monk. For him, their conception of jazz, with its wide diversity of musical possibilities and freedoms, was of inestimable importance. In addition to the historically evolved European harmonies involving the accordion, the classical component has also assumed an unmistakable position in Paier's compositions. He himself aims to express a positively charged polarity in music: attraction and rejection, weight and lightness, loudness and quietness, openness and selfcontainment, strict discipline and passionate explosiveness. He accomplishes this feat again and again in an inimitable manner, enthralling his audience in concert tours in Israel, France, Italy, Sweden, Poland and many other European countries. Be it as a soloist, with his duo partner Gerald Preinfalk, in the trio with Stefan Gfrerrer and Roman Werni, or the radio.string.quartet.vienna – Klaus Paier ranks among the great European accordionists with a world-wide reputation.

Booklet for Silk Road