brownie Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 Polish jazz musician and film music composer Krysztof Komeda has become something of a cult figure since his tragic death in 1969. Komeda's main claim to fame was the music he composed for his friend Roman Polanki's films including 'Rosemary's Baby'. He also composed film music for a number of Jerzy Skolimovsky's films including the 1966 film 'Le Depart' which had Komeda's music performed by people like Don Cherry, Garo Barbieri and Jean-Francois Jenny-Clark. I see a number of Komeda record albums popping up here and there. Anybody knows if the sountrack to the 'Le Depart' film was ever included in one of Komeda's albums? 'Le Depart' was a black-and-white film set in Belgium. French new wave actor Jean-Pierre Leaud had the main part. The music was excellent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnS Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 (edited) I can remember the impact the music had on me when I first saw Polanski's Knife in the Water. Though I think it was probably Bernt Rosengren's tenor that caught my ear then rather than Komeda's playing or writing. There are about a dozen Komeda cds on Power Bros but I don't know about Le Depart Edited April 28, 2003 by JohnS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claude Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 (edited) Krzysztof Komeda - Le depart - Culture Publishers CPJ8-1032 (Japan) http://www.geo.ryerson.ca/komeda/ http://www.komeda.vernet.pl/ Edited April 28, 2003 by Claude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A Lark Ascending Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 I have yet to hear Komeda's CDs but can strongly recommend Tomasz Stanko's celebration of his music, Litania, on ECM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 Dusty Groove (the bastards!) have this guy's stuff out the wazzoo. I had no real idea who he was, but he sure seems to have been prolific! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Green Dolphin Posted April 28, 2003 Report Share Posted April 28, 2003 Astigmatic is the one to start with,Stanko,in particular on great form.There's a live version also on Power Bros. featuring future violinist Michal Urbaniak on tenor-haven't heard it,anybody else done so? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brownie Posted April 29, 2003 Author Report Share Posted April 29, 2003 Thanks for the posts. Claude seems to have nailed down the soundtrack release (in Japan of course!!). Will have to get that one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king ubu Posted April 29, 2003 Report Share Posted April 29, 2003 Komedas work is published by a Polish record label, no possiblity to order online directly from them. go here for info on Komeda: Komeda Homepage if you go for the discography, you'll see a list of his releases. The Poljazz issues seem to contain the early music which is also on the Power Bros. series discs. And the single Power Bros. releases also seem identical with the corresponding discs from the Power Bros. series. Anyone happens to know whether the Power Bros. series is sort of a complete documentation of Komeda's music, and whether they are available elsewhere but via the Power Bros. website? (as they don't accept direct credit card orders, it seems to be quite complicated to get this stuff from them, I figure) (I can still kick my ass for not picking up all the Komeda stuff when visiting Poland some 3 or 4 years ago - but they had such good prices and quite some OOP US-releases, that I could not buy all the stuff I would have liked - jazz fan's destiny ) ubu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king ubu Posted April 29, 2003 Report Share Posted April 29, 2003 now this site seems to answer some questions - and it was not the Power Bros. series but the seemingly 23-volume-series on Polonia which I passed by (f*****g s**t!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teasing the Korean Posted January 20, 2013 Report Share Posted January 20, 2013 (edited) Finally saw "Cul-de-Sac" last night, which has been hard to find in the US. I've had the music since the late 1990s. It was a good film, not as good as "Knife in the Water" in my opinion but dealing with similar themes. The music as heard in the film is pretty sparse. The soundtrack releases typically consist of 6 tracks from the film, and then adding either 1 or 2 more tracks of EZ versions that presumably came out as a single. There are, I believe, 2 tracks in the film that are not on any of the releases I have. I wonder if these will make their way out or if they are lost. Edited January 21, 2013 by Teasing the Korean Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StarThrower Posted January 20, 2013 Report Share Posted January 20, 2013 (edited) I have the Polskie Nagrania reissue of Zbigniew Namyslowski's Winobranie album. Great stuff! Grooves Inc has good prices on Polish jazz. Edited January 20, 2013 by starthrower Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teasing the Korean Posted January 29, 2013 Report Share Posted January 29, 2013 I picked up the twofer CD with the soundtracks to "Le Depart" and "Bariera." So far I have listened to the former but did digital needledrops on the latter. "Depart" sounds like parts were taken directly from the film's soundtrack; other parts may be from the film's mono music stem. Not the best fidelity, but cool music. "Bariera" sounds like it's from a better source, from my random samplings. I will check it out tomorrow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teasing the Korean Posted February 25, 2015 Report Share Posted February 25, 2015 So I have: Cul-de-Sac Knife in the Water Rosemary's Baby Fearless Vampire Killers Le Depart Bariera Astigmatic. "Astigmatic" is the only non-soundtrack album I have by Komeda. There seems to be a general consensus that it is his best and/or "most important" jazz album. Are there other albums by Komeda that anyone can recommend? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kh1958 Posted February 25, 2015 Report Share Posted February 25, 2015 (edited) Live at the Jazz Jamboree Festival, 1961-1967. http://www.amazon.com/Krzysztof-Komeda-Live-Jamboree-Festival/dp/B00EVLPK7M/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1424836913&sr=1-1&keywords=komeda+jamboree Edited February 25, 2015 by kh1958 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sgcim Posted February 25, 2015 Report Share Posted February 25, 2015 David Amram mentioned him in "Vibrations" (his first autobiography) as training some of the European musicians he worked with when he was stationed in Europe during his stint in the army. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teasing the Korean Posted March 16, 2017 Report Share Posted March 16, 2017 Hour-long documentary: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sgcim Posted March 17, 2017 Report Share Posted March 17, 2017 Fascinating documentary, thanks for posting. From what I had read of him, I thought he was a much older guy, because he had so much influence on Polish musicians. Dead at 37, after becoming an E,N &T doctor, and then scoring 65 films. There's a good doc. on the composer William Walton on you tube called "At the Haunted End of the Day" that I tried to post a link to, but it wouldn't paste for some reason. WW scored all of the Olivier Shakespeare films. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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