Description
Because of the prominent position of the blues in jazz, he found it an attractive idea to commission a number of mainly Dutch composers to write blues or blues-like pieces. The first series was ready by the end of 1996 and was premiered at the BIMHUIS, the foremost jazz stage in Amsterdam, in January 1997. After that premiere, also composers from the countries where Worms had performed, or where he was going to play, were invited to contribute to the project.
At this time, as his project New Blues for Piano is coming to an end, twenty years after it began, more than 200 new blues pieces from around 50 different countries have been written for Marcel Worms.
From these pieces, one can get an idea of what the blues means to the contemporary composer. When the blues written by composers from different countries are compared, often (but not always) the various cultural backgrounds are revealed quite clearly. One will notice that every composer approaches the blues in a very personal way and that some of the compositions have only remote connections with traditional blues. The composers were free to use or not to use the characteristic elements of the blues, such as blue notes, a certain series of chords, etc. Most pieces are completely written out while in others the performer is expected to improvise.
On the first CD of this album a selection from the most recent repertory of new blues (composed between 2011 and 2016) can be heard.
For the second CD Marcel Worms chose those pieces from the repertoire of the entire project that are most dear to him and that he played most often during his tours around the world.
