Musical meditation has been an inseparable element of the Jazztopad Festival programme for several years. What exactly is it about? Are the sounds coming from the stage supposed to help the listeners immerse themselves in their own thoughts, bring them into a meditative state of consciousness? Or is it rather the ritual taking place on stage that should focus the audience's attention? There will be as many correct answers to these questions as there are listeners at the concert of Marta Warelis and Frank Rosaly.

Looking at the hundreds of projects in which the Puerto Rican drummer has been involved, one can make a dizzying list of his collaborators. Rosaly has been a member of bands of such key figures of today’s scene as Tony Malaby, Dave Rempis, Matana Roberts and Ken Vandermark, but he has also had the opportunity to perform with real avant-garde doyens – Roscoe Mitchell, Marshall Allen and Peter Brötzmann, who laid the foundations for the style of free jazz. Pianist Marta Warelis comes from Wrocław, but from there she went to study in the Netherlands. There she joined the improvised music community in Amsterdam. For her, jazz was just the starting point of her journey, and she has continued to avoid any musical labels. She has only one original album to her credit so far, but it’s phenomenal. This is a solo recording titled a grain of Earth, with which she made her debut on the phonographic market last year. After the premiere, the American magazine “DownBeat” placed Warelis on the list of the fifteen most interesting names in European improvised music.

The Wrocław meeting of the two artists, whose paths crossed in Amsterdam, will be another premiere prepared especially for the Jazztopad Festival. Yet this will not be their first collaboration, witness one of the drummer’s recent projects with the participation of Warelis (Ruidoscuro) or the album from two years ago, recorded in a quartet without a leader and featuring Rosaly, Waleris, Lumley, Dikeman (Sunday at De Ruimte).