Mike Majkowski: double bass
Every wholehearted instrumentalist running a combination of wood and strings knows it. Scales and chords can be practiced for decades, but if you can’t come to the special moment where you become one with the instrument, there’s no actual reason in going on: a defining event is, and will always be, absent.
Mike Majkowski released this concise LP at the end of 2013, and it’s typically the analyst’s fault if such an unpresuming, and yet impacting statement has been left unplayed to date. Two sides, 15 minutes each, completely different dynamics, the same conclusion. Namely, oneness – that which emerges from the research of stasis through motion carried on by the Australian/Polish bassist. In “Belt Of Sand” he enforces the law of arco-generated extreme tremolo in an arm-stressing overflow of vitalizing currents. “A Shadow Of Silver Dipped In Gold” is divided in two nearly exact halves: in the first a two-note figure is repeated forever, whereas in the final segment a solitary plucked pitch rich in overtones (as, indeed, the rest of the music) leads us towards the end of the whole.
The point of all this being: Majkowski is looking for the Tone. He is definitely aware of representing a small fraction of a larger quivering entity – which may or may not be considered incalculable – and that playing hundreds of notes to achieve what can be done with just a few remarkable choices is altogether fruitless. He manages to involve us totally, provided that one’s willing to tune to equivalent frequencies: of resonance and, especially, cerebral. The implications are huge, the words still insufficient.
MASSIMO RICCI. TOUCHING EXTREMES. 