Ratko Zjaca - Life on Earth (2018) [Hi-Res]

If you compared Ratko Zjaca with a share of stock, the stock chart would clearly have to show a trend upward. Appearing as an insider‘s tip and known if all by a cionados, the exceptional Croatian guitarist has continuously worked his way up from year to year and from CD to CD. Each disc—most recently ‚Beyond The Lines“(IOR CD 77117),“Now And Then“(IOR CD 77110- 2),“The Way We Talk “with Simone Zanchini (IOR CD 77104-2) and „Continental Talk“(IOR CD 77097-2)— has revealed a signi cant increase in maturity, perfection and serenity. Stock market-af ne contemporaries are certainly going to be very pleased about the enormous growth rates, inexhaustible inventiveness, sustainability and substance of this musical security. If there were a genuine, sure re investment option with guaranteed appreciation for real lovers of jazz, it would have to bear the name Ratko Zjaca.

Alone the list of prominent co-musicians working side by side with him says a lot about the creative potential of the sympathetic string magician. John Patitucci, Randy Brecker, Steve Gadd, Adam Nussbaum, Miroslav Vitous, Reggie Workman, Al Foster, Ron Carter, Benny Bailey, Gary Peacock, Jimmy Cobb and Alvin Queen helped him over the years to learn how to listen to others, but also to sharpen his own sense of what is feasible. It seems to be a logical consequence that Grammy and Oscar winner Antonio Sanchez with his exceptional skills on the drums plays along with him on his latest album „Life On Earth“. He and Stefano Bedetti (tenor/soprano saxophone) and Renato Chicco (Hammond organ) open a new chapter in Ratko Zjaca’s travel diary, which is quite considerable in the meanwhile, and whose dream has long been a global jazz language free of national borders, ideologies and styles. „Without ever having consciously planned it, my bands have always been a mixture of musicians from all countries. It was no different this time either. Antonio comes from New York City, Stefano from Italy, Renato from Austria and I come from Croatia, although I have lived in the Netherlands for some time now. I nd such constellations extremely interesting and invigorating.“

The fact that the session of „Life On Earth“ was then also held in Italian Forli near Cesena rounds out the cosmopolitan touch. However, „Life on Earth“ is far from a random project because of that. When Ratko Zjaca, Stefano Bedetti and Renato Chicco met each other for the rst time in 2016, all three quickly sensed a deep internal connection. „It quickly became clear for me that these might be just the musicians, with whom I wanted to record at least my next album and take my next tour. You sense something like that very quickly. When I then asked Antonio, one of my all-time favorite drummers, if he would join us, my dream cast was perfect!“

However, the reputation of Ratko Zjaca would not have experienced such a rapid growth if the guitarist simply adapted to his respective environments like a chameleon as well as hid behind his prominent co-musicians subserviently and inconspicuously. In the case of Antonio Sanchez, the drummer of the Pat Metheny Group, Zjaca was even suspected of only wanting to give a veritable European blueprint of the superstar. Far from it! Whoever has followed the development of the band leader and his enormous potential, which is continually becoming increasingly clear, will nd a very individual, unmistakable musical language between European in uences and American improvisation culture as well as between small, shimmering acoustic ashes and severe storm surges. If Ratko Zjaca were a share of stock, there would only one tip: buy!