MINIM feat. Sainkho

The music of the young Polish band led by guitarist Kuba Wójcik explores new dimensions inspired by the Siberian-born singer and vocal artist Sainkho Namtchylak and her experience. Second concert at 22:00.

As the crow flies, there are 530.94 km between Leipzig and the Polish border. A stone's throw, so to speak. Despite the close proximity and although musicians and bands from Poland were and are regular guests at the Leipzig Jazz Days, the exchange between the young musical scenes does not seem to be immense and, within the scope of our festival's possibilities, definitely worth promoting! That's why in 2021 musicians from the different scenes will meet in partly new constellations at several points in the festival and with MINIM feat. Sainkho, a project of the Polish guitarist Kuba Wójcik, we have a band as guest whose debut album "Earth" has been described in the music blog Soundtrack Of My Life as one of the "most interesting recordings released in the Polish scene in 2020".

The quintet's second album "Manifesto - Live at SPATiF" will be released on September 21. The band will play their release concert at this year's Leipziger Jazztage. Wójcik sees the album's release as an act of protest against cultural events being left behind in difficult times, writing, "Culture is not just an addition to the social landscape in times of prosperity, but rather a force from within the human psyche that constructs our interpersonal space. Culture simply helps us overcome difficulties." Three years ago, Wójcik made the decision to contact Tuvan vocal artist Sainkho Namtchylak, whose work he had long followed with enthusiasm, and propose a collaboration. "I had decided that I wanted to record a minimalist, avant-garde album with a singer who could sing with the 'voice of the earth.' Sainkho was the only option," he wrote in response to my email inquiry, putting a laughing smiley at the back of the addendum, "I sent her my music. Fortunately, she liked it". Namtchylak learned overtone singing of Turkic peoples from her grandmother. At the age of twenty, she moved to Moscow and made contacts with the avant-garde scene there, establishing herself as a singer. Since the 1990s, she has continuously devoted herself to the synthesis of traditional Siberian music with musical styles such as jazz and pop. 

Kuba Wójcik was still thinking about the question posed at short notice - and assuming that a closer link between the German and Polish scenes is accepted as a sensible goal - of what would be necessary on the part of the musicians and the audience in order to create more proximity and exchange. We will certainly have more to say about this on October 7 at the naTo sociocultural center. We, too, are still in the process of thinking and trying things out and hope that the invitation from MINIM feat. Sainkho and the musicians involved will provide new impulses and freshly unraveled threads of conversation here in Leipzig and 530.94 km away on the other side of the border.