Neo-classical music in which all the power and performance potential of double bass are discovered, accompanied by pianoforte and ambient electronical music.
ZKHR announced release of the LP “Pieces for Double Bass & Piano” on March the 1st of 2022. There are not so many compositions for double bass written. The musician promises to expand the abilities of double bass in a fresh new way, to find experimental images and change listener’s vision of the very fundamental function of this great musical instrument in this work.
The album consists of 9 compositions. Double bass part is recorded by the author, while pianoforte part is recorded by Kamilla Leonenkova, Gnesin Russian Academy of Music student.
The pieces, presented on the record, slide into one another, creating the feeling of an endless story. The composer transmits emotional experience of the persona with the bow movements, describes the world filled with some special sadness and romanticism with the help of sounds. This romanticism is picturesquely unusual, it violates the conservative form and gets exposed in something that comes to be bulky and massive at first sight.
The sounds of double bass and pianoforte slip into the half-light constrained with meditative silence. These sounds fill the whole room peacefully and confidently, distracting the listener from the routine and ordinary things, inviting to the world of melancholy and contemplation upon something really important.
This is exactly the way one can describe atmosphere created by the talented composer Zakhar Zaitsev, who works under the stage name ZKHR and violates classic composing traditions.
The musician successfully combines solo career with participation in diversified projects. One can hear Zakhar’s bass-guitar on the records of the rock bands Target Audience and Animatronika, double bass – on the acoustic records of Solarburst or in combination with nyckelharpa and harp in the folk band Opletai repertoir, pianoforte – in Natalia Drepina and indie-pop singer Daria Loiter’s (the band LOAD’s frontwoman) songs.
ZKHR’s talent has been noticed far outside of Russia. The composer’s debut album “Ride” was critically acclaimed by the international media: Portugal Threshold Magazine, German Kulturform, French totoromoon. Zakhar cooperates with the mexican artist René Villarreal, recorded soundtrack to the advertisement by the Spanish designer Maria Jose Garcia and the Amerrican designer Lory Sun Artistry. After graduating the Popakademie in Baden-Wurttenberg Zakhar Zaitsev started cooperating with the German musician Jon Darco.
The cover has been created by the artist Anna Mikhailova, well-known for her artworks for the books “Herman” and “Fish don’t melt” published in Samokat publishing house, design of the web media portals «Такие дела» (That’s the way it goes”), «Батенька, да вы трансформер» (Oh, dear! You’re a transformer), cooperation with Alexey Kozlov’s jazz club and participation in the international art festivals (Fumetto comix-festival, Typomania, MorsFest, Non/Fiction).
