With good connections, the flight from Brno to Baghdad takes over a dozen hours. We will visit both places in a single evening and travel through time. The concert will feature two projects, each capable of warping space-time! The Dálava band and the Lorenzo Bianchi Hoesch and Amir ElSaffar duo will both draw upon specific locations on the world map.

The Dálava project was launched in 2013 by vocalist Julia Úlehla and guitarist Aram Bajakian. Their work focuses on the improvisational reinterpretation and development of traditional material, specifically Moravian songs collected by Julia’s great-grandfather in the first half of the 20th century. In Wrocław, they will be joined by Peggy Lee on cello and Josh Zubot on violin.

Later, jazz and improvised music will converge with electronica, ambient, and ancient Arab traditions, presented by the electro-acoustic duo formed by Lorenzo Bianchi Hoesch and Amir ElSaffar. In the project for Jazztopad, ElSaffar will sing and play both trumpet and santoor, creating a sound that is trance-like yet dramatically varied, shifting from contemplation to the agitated energy of free jazz and back again. Hoesch will loop and process these sounds in real time. Although the artists first performed together in 2022, they had previously collaborated on a larger project titled Luminiscencia. In it, ElSaffar combined maqam with flamenco, and it was then that he discovered Hoesch, an Italian musician using electronics in a way that makes him a fully-fledged participant in the musical dialogue.