Brussels Jazz Orchestra & I Solisti del Vento

For 'Agatha', the Finnish composer Kerkko Koskinen (b. 1973) turned to the stories of Agatha Christie as his starting point. It is not a musical impression of a storyline; call it rather a tribute to one of his idols. During the 1990s, Koskinen helped found one of the most popular Finnish pop and rock bands, Ultra Bra, which consisted of no less than seventeen musicians! Koskinen strives to get his productions to sound 'big'. For 'Agatha', he has picked on the ideal combination to give expression to his sound: a jazz orchestra expanded to include two horns, oboe, flute and three percussionists, supplemented by a solo trumpet. Poetry and other non-musical sources play an important part in Koskinen's compositional process, instances being the music based on texts by Hikmet, Akhmatova and Garcia Lorca. Trumpet-player Alex Sipiagin (b. 1967) studied in Moscow. Moving to New York in 1991, he quickly became part of the premium jazz scene - Michael Breckers Quindectet, the Mingus Big Band and various Dave Holland bands. I Solisti del Vento is among the world's best wind ensembles and operates out of deSingel. The permanent core of the ensemble brings together top musicians who have already built up strong reputations as soloists.