The new album of Veronika Harcsa, Anastasia Razvalyaeva and Bálint Bolcsó magically transforms Schubert’s music: improvisations, timbres between classical and jazz vocal techniques, and live electronic effects expand the infinite, sensual and eerily beautiful universe of Schubert’s songs into a contemporary spatial experience, at the same time enhancing the expressive tools of the human voice and the harp. The first part of the series, Debussy NOW! (2020) was nominated for the Innovation Award of Classical:NEXT, the largest international conference on classical music.

The NOW! series originally started as the duo of harpist Anastasia Razvalyaeva and jazz singer Veronika Harcsa, who wanted to experiment with the possibilities of non-classical voice training, and substituting the piano with harp accompaniment in Debussy’s songs. They were then joined by Márton Fenyvesi, who expanded the musical texture not so much with his guitar playing, but rather by transforming the live vocal and harp sound with electronic modulations, effects and filters. Layers of acoustic composition and electronics organically merged in the dreamlike world of Debussy NOW!. In the second part of the NOW! series, Veronika Harcsa, Anastasia Razvalyaeva and their accomplice Bálint Bolcsó worked together to develop their reading of Schubert’s songs from the beginning. The electronics on this album span the entire range of electronic music from abstract noise to techno, and go far beyond transforming the sound of the voice and the harp: Bolcsó creates his own sound from selected musical elements of Schubert’s songs, luring both the voice and the harp into intense dialogue. Although Schubert’s music is most famous for its transcendent harmonies, the trio found that rhythm is just as important, so they amplified them as grooves.

Veronika Harcsa is justly the most popular Hungarian jazz singer at home and the most recognized abroad. Her duo with Bálint Gyémánt, which has also participated in the Jazzahead! showcase, is already releasing its third album on German labels, while BMC Records hosts her contemporary improvisational and classical projects such as the already mentioned Debussy NOW!, Modern Art Orchestra’s Bartók album, Different Aspects of Silence with Kornél Fekete-Kovács, the Robert Balzar Trio and Dan Bárta, or Shekhinah and The Language of Flowers, created in collaboration with Gábor Gadó. Anastasia Razvalyaeva resisted the path and stereotypes set for female harpists from her early teens, mounting a number of extraordinary projects: she arranged Schubert’s Winterreise with Emőke Baráth, while her Duo SeRa with saxophonist Erzsébet Seleljo has fostered the creation and performance of several contemporary works in Hungary and abroad. Bálint Bolcsó is one of the most knowledgeable and sensitive artists on the Hungarian electronic music scene, and a teacher at the University of Pécs and the Academy of Music in Budapest. In addition to his composing activities, he is a regular participant of sound poetry evenings, performances and improvised concerts, and has contributed to nearly 20 recordings. As a testament to their achievements and the potential of their collaboration, the trio has already been included in the roster of Tinka Steinhoff’s renowned agency, and invited to the Classical:NEXT showcase and prestigious festivals.