Look carefully at the picture inside the cover. What do you see? I see five friends reacting differently to the same situation (I remember a hilarious joke told by Ferenc). You can fill in for yourself what we’re all thinking at the moment the photo was taken, and I think it’s interesting to speculate what was happening at the time.

Are we friends in every sense of the word? No. I’ve played together with Michael for 20 years, but I would not be at all surprised if my number was not listed in his phone book. And even though I’ve played around 500 concerts with Wilbert we only occasionally discuss important personal matters that have nothing to do with our music. Of course we know that our doors are wide open at any time for any matter, but we simply choose to share our personal life with other people. As for Miklós and Ferenc, we only met a day before this picture was taken.

We’ve played the Q program all over the world, with various guests. Normally we fly in, rehearse for an hour or two, and play the concert. One of the nice things about improvised music is that this works! You simply get together with a complete stranger and immediately start communicating musically with him or her. It’s genuine communication where you lay yourself bare. Giving and taking, inspiring and surprising each other and throwing each other off balance. We don’t set down very much beforehand, just a few tunes. It’s like a spoken conversation, where you discuss certain topics but don’t decide in advance who is going to say what. It evolves naturally.

Music is the main means of communication for musicians and you put your body and soul into that communication, it’s sincere. So the people you play with are friends with whom you share a deep personal experience. I consider Miklós and Ferenc to be not only great musicians, but friends too. Like Michael and Wilbert they come very close and it feels good.

Where does that leave you? Just like your interpretation of the picture you will have your own view of the music on this record. Just like the five musicians in the picture, each expressing a different reaction to an identical situation, you will make your own story from the music presented. You are the connecting link. Of course I hope you like the result, and, like me, are grateful to BMC for initiating this project.

Michiel Braam


michielbraam.com