Arkady Shilkloper
| Arkady Shilkloper | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Background information | |
| Born |
October 17, 1956 Moscow, Russia |
| Genres | Jazz, classical, world, free improvisation, avant-garde |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, composer |
| Instruments | horn, alphorn, flugelhorn, etc. |
| Years active | 1962–present |
| Labels | ArtBeat Music |
| Associated acts | Mikhail Alperin, Sergey Kuryokhin, Lionel Hampton |
Arkady Shilkloper (born October 17, 1956) is a Russian multi-instrumentalist (French horn, alphorn, flugelhorn, vogelhorn, corno da caccia, corno pastoriccio, didgeridoo) and composer, currently living in Germany. He is also known as one of the best jazz performers on French horn and alphorn in the world.
Shilkloper was born in Moscow and started playing alto horn at the age of six. After two years of military service (1974 - 1976) he studied at the Moscow Gnessin Institute from 1976 to 1981. At the same time he began his career in the orchestra of the Bolshoi Theatre (1978 - 1985) and also began his first jazz activities.
In 1984, he formed a duo with his colleague from the Bolshoi Theatre, bassist Mikhail Karetnikow, with whom he recorded the LP "Move". (Melodiya, С60 26043 003)
"Horncall", 1988, by Jeffrey Agrell (Professor of Horn at the University of Iowa School of Music)
“Shilkloper and his bass player swing like nobody’s business. He rips and riffs and goes places that horn players aren’t supposed to go without a net, map, seat belt, crash helmet, overhead air support, and a note from their mothers. And he does so with extraordinary ease and musicality. I think maybe nobody ever told him ‘Jazz playing on horn is very difficult, and probably not natural or perhaps the phrase does not translate into Russian.’ I’d walk a camel a mile to hear this guy.”
From 1985 to 1989 he played with A. Kirichenko and S. Letov in the band Tri-O (LP "Three Holes").
At the same period he was a member of the Moscow State Philharmonic Symphony.
Since 1986 he collaborates with pianist Mikhail Alperin. Their first album "Wave of Sorrow" (1990) was the first Russian album on ECM. Later Shilkloper participated in three more Alperin recordings for ECM: «North Story» (1997), «First Impression» (1999) and «Her First Dance» (2008).
The «First Impression» was recorded on December 1997 at Rainbow Studio, Oslo. Tyran Grillo wrote in his review: "Ukrainian pianist and composer Misha Alperin joins forces for the first time in session with British reedist John Surman (a last-minute replacement for Tore Brunborg) in this melodious, spontaneous set. Augmented by Arkady Shilkloper on French horn and flugelhorn, Terje Gewelt on bass, and Jon Christensen on drums, their hypnotic nexus breathes ounces of thematic life into the “Overture” in watery, stepwise motion. Surman’s reptilian soprano takes us in some unexpected directions throughout a holistic introduction, while his unmistakable baritone threads resilient cables through “Twilight house” and “City Dance.” The first of these is where the session truly comes to life through his interactions with Alperin, while the latter serves a touch of groove in a veritable trill buffet (think Snakeoil). “Movement” features classical percussionist Hans-Kristian Kjos Sørensen (heard previously on No Birch) in a spindly improv, the pointillism and melancholy draw of which only thinly veil its composed undercurrent. A lovely solo from Shilkloper on French horn rises like a paper lantern lit and offered to the sky. Yet these are but the roofing to the album’s five “Impressions,” each a pillar in the dust."
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Wikipedia