Borbély Mihály - Looking Back from Half Way (2025) Hi-Res

This album is my most personal creation: sometimes gentle, sometimes flamboyant, sometimes allowing insight into surprisingly intimate realms, sometimes a revealing, sincere confession in music. From the first note to the last, it is improvisation. It is the germination of many long-cherished musical ideas, matured in my inner ear, the imprint of so many musical inspirations and life experiences, and as such, I intend it to be free of all manner of self-serving virtuoso instrumental solutions, lightning tempos, artful compositional and improvisational techniques - every moment of it was conceived in a spirit of humility towards Music. This is what the playing of a host of instruments serves to do, even if it sometimes seems otherwise. I am not guided by the "...and here's another" attitude of the music clown; simply, these are the sounds and colours I hear inside, for which I seek out the right tool, and if this resonates with listeners, they will also feel that the piece in question had to be played on that particular instrument.

All of my albums so far have been brought to life by the most typical form of jazz performance, joint music-making with the exacting standards of chamber music, and I have written most of my compositions bearing in mind particular bands, and the excellent fellow musicians that play in them. I have always enjoyed the musical freedom of my occasional solo concerts, which for a wind instrumentalist is after all an unusual situation to perform in, and although I have long been toying with the idea of recording this, I was waiting for the moment when I could no longer keep it to myself. Listening to the result, I'm glad I didn't rush into it; I had to mature and rise to the task, both personally and artistically. And if this time listeners discern a more pronounced presence of the intellectual‒emotional side in my playing, they have already grasped the key to decoding the messages I have woven in sound.

~Mihály Borbély