In the organizer's words:

17th Kassel JazzFrühling

There are many beautiful voices, in jazz today more than ever. Viktoria Tolstoy, however, is unique: she is the great melodramatist of jazz and Pat Metheny said to her after a performance: "When you sing, the sun rises." A bipolar musician who, like no other, can make happiness sound fragile and threatened, but the bitter sound magical and beautiful. She has also conceptually framed and perfected this art since becoming an ACT artist in 2003: Whether she focused on material by Esbjörn Svensson, whose e.s.t., so to speak, began as her accompanying trio, or most recently Herbie Hancock, on classical originals, Swedish standards or repertoire from Russia, the homeland of her ancestors.

Her new album "A Moment Of Now" is now more open than ever before, for one simple reason: "The concept this time is Jacob and me," says Viktoria. An intimate album as a duo, focused entirely on Viktoria Tolstoy's long-standing musical partnership with pianist Jacob Karlzon. Karlzon's playing also thrives on the nuances, the transitions, the ambiguous - regardless of whether the 43-year-old is sitting at the grand piano, the Fender Rhodes, the synthesizer or the celesta glockenspiel, drawing inspiration from classics such as Ravel or hard rockers like KoRn. He has been Tolstoy's accompanist for almost 15 years and will probably remain so, even if, like Esbjörn Svensson in the past, he is now also on the road to success under his own name - see Jacob Karlzon 3 "More". "One usually knows in advance what the other is thinking and will do, without anyone having to say anything. It's almost a bit spooky," says Tolstoy with a laugh, explaining their blind understanding of each other.

What they both need for their style like a fish needs water are melodies. 14 of the most beautiful are collected on "A Moment Of Now": "Songs that we had heard a lot in the past few years and that had forced themselves on us, but also some that were completely new to us and challenged us," explains Tolstoy. This resulted in a selection that sounds completely homogeneous and as if it was made for this duo, even though it comes from a wide variety of stylistic and often surprising sources: From the classical "Apres Un Reve" by the Frenchman Gabriel Faurè to the soulful pop "Send One Your Love" by Stevie Wonder, on which Tolstoy invited Jocke Bergström, who is still completely unknown in this country, to a vocal duet to melt away, to the jazzy "Shadow And Light" by Joe Zawinul.
Thanks to Tolstoy's father, who suggested "Against All Odds", virtually the entire history of Genesis is represented: Their "Taking It All Too Hard", Peter Gabriel's "Red Rain" and, of course, Phil Collins'
"Against All Odds".