The Kosciuszko Foundation is proud to co-sponsor the 30th Anniversary Tour of Marcin Wasilewski Trio in the United States.

Starting September 5th, the Trio will perform in several American cities. Please check the trio’s Facebook page for the updates.

Tickets and info on the Washington DC concerts at Blues Alley HERE

Marcin Wasilewski Trio – with Marcin Wasilewski, piano, (born 1975), Sławomir Kurkiewicz, double- bass, (born 1975) and Michał Miśkiewicz (born 1977), drums – is one of the brightest stars of the Polish jazz scene, recognised for their unique talent in blending tradition with contemporary sound. The trio has achieved international recognition for their exceptional talent and ability to captivate audiences, leaving a lasting impression with their powerful and emotionally charged performance with depth and sheer musicality. In 2024, the band celebrates 30 years of playing together in an unchanged line-up.

For the past three remarkable decades, the Marcin Wasilewski Trio has graced the world of jazz with their extraordinary talent and unwavering commitment to musical excellence, becoming synonymous with innovation and storytelling through their music. Their remarkable journey includes collaborations with jazz luminaries like Tomasz Stanko, Joe Lovano, Charles Lloyd and more, along with the release of seven exceptional albums under the ECM Records label.

The band combines the grand tradition of the challenging piano trio tenet and creates their own distinct sound in doing so. It is also one of the most consistently developing bands of the Polish music scene, and one that is very open to inspiration from the surrounding environment. The Marcin Wasilewski Trio is considered one of the most acclaimed and unique jazz formations of its generation, and it has garnered recognition in its native Poland as well as abroad.

Trio’s current history goes back even further, to the year 1990. It was then that the Simple Acoustic Trio was founded by a group of students from a music high school in Koszalin. Their debut performance would come a year later, and the band quickly began to garner awards across Poland. In 1993, the young percussionist Michał Miśkiewicz (the son of renowned Polish saxophonist Henryk Miśkiewicz) joined the Simple Acoustic Trio and since then the group plays together untouched by any personal disturbances.

Their very first record entitled “Komeda” came out in 1995, published by the Kraków based Gowi Records label. It became one of the most widely commented debuts of the year. An homage to the work of Krzysztof Komeda, it consisted entirely of his compositions. The critics and audience alike didn’t fail to hear in the recordings much more than mere interpretations of the historic pieces of Polish jazz. The reviews hailed the trio a creative continuation of this history, and one of the biggest promises of the Polish jazz scene.

In 2024 Wasilewski, Kurkiewicz and Miśkiewicz celebrate 30 years together with Marcin Wasilewski Trio- 30th Anniversary Tour 2024, co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland, co-organized by the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, and supported with some Polish Institutes around the world. What a pleasant coincidence was ECM release of the Tomasz Stanko Quartet’s September Night album in June 2024 – recorded at Munich’s Muffathalle twenty years ago, in September 2004, previously-unreleased concert recording of the Tomasz Stanko Quartet – a fascinating document, capturing a developmental chapter in the music between the song forms of the Suspended Night repertoire and the improvised areas that the Poles would explore on Lontano.

In Trio’s native Poland, they are unquestionable jazz stars, with their exceptional contributions to the music landscape. Throughout their career, they have maintained a consistent standard of artistry, connecting deeply with audiences and leaving an indelible mark on the global jazz community. Since their very beginnings, the group has been building its position with numerous prizes, among them the many Fryderk Awards of the Polish Music Academy. In Poland Marcin Wasilewski enjoys to be the laureate of the biggest number of FRYDERYK Music Awards in jazz categories (11 statuettes of Fryderyk, incl. 5 x Jazz Album Of the Year, 6 x Jazz Artist Of The Year). The FRYDERYK Award’s name refers to the original Polish spelling of Polish composer Frédéric Chopin’s first name, and its status in the Polish public can be compared to the American Grammy.

In 2010, the Marcin Wasilewski Trio also won the “Jazz Top” Annual Readers’ Poll of the Jazz Forum magazine for the Best Acoustic Band in Poland, gaining nearly twice as many votes as the Tomasz Stańko Quintet. From 2018 the Trio every year, consistently reaffirms its leading position in the Polish jazz scene, been voted the Best Acoustic Band in Poland in the Annual Jazz Forum Magazine’s “Jazz Top” Reader’s/ Critic’s Poll.

In 2005 and 2011 Marcin Wasilewski was voted „piano rising star” in DownBeat Magazine’s Annual International Critics and Readers Polls. Four albums of the Trio („Live” 2018, „January” 2008, „Faithful” 2011 and „Spark Of Life” 2014) were also ranked on the Billboard’s Jazz Album Charts, while in Germany, the band was nominated for the German Jazz Award 2022 (Deutscher Jazzpreis) in the Best International Band category.

Over the 30 years of their activity on the music scene, Marcin Wasilewski Trio has cooperated with numerours internationally acclaimed musicians both individually and as a band. They performed with Tomasz Szukalski, Piotr Wojtasik, Michał Urbaniak, Janusz Muniak and Henryk Miśkiewicz, and also participated in international projects with stars of the international jazz scene, such as: Charles Lloyd, Joe Lovano, Jan Garbarek, Branford Marsalis, Manu Katché, Nils Petter Molvær, Dino Saluzzi, Palle Danielson, Jon Christensen, Arild Andersen, Bernt Rosengren, John Surman, Bobo Stenson, Gianluigi Trovesi, Arthur Blythe and more.

Source: Artists materials, Maciej Karłowski culture.pl