Small Obstacles by Zura Zaj

"La mer, la mer, toujours recommencėe”
— Paul Valéry, Le cimetière marin

The sea, the sea.
The journey, the waves.
The swell of the tide, the motion of drift.
Time folds back on itself and recommences again, ever changing, ever anew. We catch our breath and steer ahead towards a suggestion of lines on the horizon. Eastbound to where the sun rises, to where the tide caresses island shores, where acres of green stretch ahead. Landfall is nigh, we may alight soon.

Zura Zaj’s journey started ten years ago when three young musicians met in a university orchestra and started tuning their instruments to each other’s tastes and creativity. A Hungarian roommate called it “strange sounds”, or “zura zaj” in the dialect of his home region, and so our name was born. We came together in various living rooms, attics, kitchens, a garden or two, and at times presented our results on stages. Many hours of music were written, improvised, arranged, discarded; a bass player joined and left again; plans were made to record, put on hold and revived, and finally achieved. We moved around, studied, found work, established relationships or ended them; a child was conceived, grew in tune to the album’s recording sessions, and was born during the mixing stages; a marriage will more or less coincide with the release.

Small Obstacles is the outcome of a decade of searching and finding, of overcoming and bonding. The oldest composition on the album (“Tide”) is the very first composition we wrote while the newest (“Acres”) is barely a year old. Some songs were originally written as a fourpiece and later rearranged (“Exhale”, “Atoll”, “Ever”, “Alight”), but all carry the creative touch of our hands, breaths, and bows.

We dedicate this album to Elena, who was an intimate partner of our sonic journey even before she saw our faces.

Lieze - Jonathan - Gowaart

Violin - French Horn - Guitar