Music. 50 years in : "Artsah"

- Vladimir, tell us, does the notion of "Uzbek jazz" exist?
- Yes. I will try to illustrate this by using the facts which I witnessed. When the dance orchestra of the Uzbek radio and television was created in 1963, a new page of jazz evolution in our republic was opened - this is a deep study of national music and attempts to perform it in a jazz interpretation. There were quite interesting discoveries in the compositions of Uzbek authors. Thus, composer Albert Malahov was one of the first to create jazz pieces on national material - "Shodlik" and "Star doira". Vladimir Milov and Yevgeniy Jivaev wrote successful compositions. Perhaps, the most famous jazz hit "Kiz-bola" was written by composer Enmark Salihov. In May of 1968 the first festival of jazz music in Tashkent took place. One of the conditions of the festival was an obligatory inclusion into the program of the arrangement of an Uzbek melody or one's own theme on a national basis.

There were many interesting discoveries (in total there were 17 groups). The arrangement of an Uzbek national song "Dildor" by Vyacheslav Polyanskiy was declared the best. In the 1970s Uzbek composers actively worked out the folklore, looked for ways of its synthesis with jazz. On the Fergana jazz festival in 1978 the "Eastern suite" resounded, soloed by the trumpet-player Y.Parfyonov, saxophonist K.Dobrovolskiy and bass-guitarist R.Ilyasov. In the 80s a jazz-band of S.Morduhaev (saxophone) was notable for its experiments; it played the composition "Khiva's cupolas" on many jazz festivals. By the way, Alexey Tratsevskiy, an outstanding drummer, who was one of the five best drummers of the former Soviet Union, played in this band.

In recent years there are interesting themes on a national basis in jazz interpretation in the programs of the singer Sevara Nazarhan and vocal group of Lola Abidova. Quite another matter is that we do not have festivals or special concerts with these themes. At least meetings of jazz musicians, as a rule, devoted to some kind of events, are organized from time to time with the efforts of enthusiasts. The public jazz-club tries to keep up the jazz spark in our city.

- A question for Vyacheslav: do you go to jazz-festivals?
- We used to go often before but in recent years this became difficult due to financial problems. Once Sergey Gilev was invited to Russia and not long ago three groups of Tashkent - "Inter", "Artsah" and "Caravan" took part in the international festival in Shimkent. Now we are waiting for our friends from Kazakhstan on our concert with a return visit.

- Can you name the famous musicians which contributed to the development of jazz in Uzbekistan?Create an original list of "Jazz guardsmen during 50 years".
- I can name them from memory. If I will be mistaken it will only be slight. Contrabass - Lev Havkin, Sergey Gilev, Rashid Klebeev, Vadim Largin; drummers - Gleb Nekrasov, Mikhail Goldentsveig, Eduard Gorojanin, Aleksey Tratsevskiy, Vyacheslav Safarov; pianists - Igor Aleshin, Vyacheslav polyanskiy, Igor Dmitriev, Oleg Gotskozik, Gocha Siradze; saxophones - Halil Hamidov, Bob Shukurov, Konstantin Dobrovolskiy, Vladimir Teregulov, Yuriy Jivaev, Semen Morduhaev, Lev Bugdanov, Bulat Mustaev; trumpets - Viktor Koptevskiy, Alik Hayder, Yuriy Perfenov, Alexandr Habirhanov; trombones - Leonid Telyants, Leonid Karavanchenko, Viktor Kurnitskiy; guitar - Enver Izmaylov, Eduard Mhchinyan, Stanislav Ponasyuchenko. I would like to mention those who created jaz themes, made arrangements - Yevgeniy Jivaev, Vladimir Milov, Albert Malahov, Georgiy Bugdanov, Enmark Salihov, Eduard Kalandarov. Popularizers and organizers of jazz are: Zosya Tratsevskaya, Erkin Umarov, Mansur Tashmatov, Leonid Yusupov, Vasiliy Uporov.

I will note Sergey Gilev who represented our city on many jazz-festivals where he became a laureate time and again. The list that we made is, of course, subjective but we have known each and every one of them and played with them. All of them and many others are included in the encyclopedia of S.Gilev. Time is fleeting, some musicians are not with us, some left Uzbekistan but all of them left their trace in the history of jazz in our country.