Tilbury, John

For Tomasz Sikorski

Label: Bolt Country: Poland

"It was in 1961 that I first met Tomek Sikorski. We were both in Zbigniew Drzewiecki's class at the Warsaw Conservatory. He must have been in his early twenties. I recall he was quick-tempered, volatile; he did not suffer fools gladly. His speech was quick and precise, as were his movements. "Quickly, quickly", he would exhort his friends. He loved the music of Bach and had performed one of the Books of the "48" the previous semester. Regrettably, it was before I arrived in Warsaw. We became firm friends. Hardly a day went by when we did not meet up somewhere, often with friends, to talk, especially but not only about the new music, and eat and drink, at the Bristol Hotel or in a favorite coffee bar, Telimena or Ali Baba on the Krakowskie Przedmieście street. He was the most generous of men, sometimes difficult but with a heart of gold.

The music on this album demonstrates Sikorski's unerring feeling for harmony and register; the "minimalism" of these pieces was absorbed naturally, the repetitions never seem arbitrary. Above all, this is piano music, par excellence. The improvisation for prepared piano which follows is a humble tribute, elegiac in character and full of echoes and personal reminiscences of the man and his music.

On my return to England in 1965 we lost touch; we were leading busy lifes and our paths never crossed again. But the memory remains. Strong and clear. They were good times."-John Tilbury, Linear Notes