Folk Bands and Artists

New Focus

Glasgow

Pianist Euan Stevenson and saxophonist Konrad Wiszniewski are two of the UK’s leading musicians, with achievements on both sides of the Atlantic and experience in pop and classical music as well as jazz.
Wiszniewski, who is also one of the internationally acclaimed Scottish National Jazz Orchestra’s star soloists, won the Instrumentalist of the Year title at the Scottish Jazz Awards in 2017. And Stevenson, who has given concerts and had compositions performed in the UK and US, has a deeply musical family background that includes film soundtrack conductor Muir Mathieson (who conducted the music from Brief Encounter) and the composer Cedric Thorpe Davie, who studied with Vaughan Williams and designed St Andrews University’s music course.
The two musicians formed New Focus to perform a fiftieth anniversary tribute to saxophone legend Stan Getz’s 1961 ‘jazz with strings’ album, Focus, and have since recorded two albums of original music in a similar style to the Getz work. Their first album, simply titled New Focus, was shortlisted for the Scottish Album of the Year award in 2012 and the follow-up, New Focus on Song, which reflected their engagement with both pop and folk music, was also very well received.
They have played at a number of prestigious events, including BBC Radio 3’s 70th Birthday celebrations at the South Bank in London in 2016, in a concert that was broadcast live. Since then they have appeared in duo, quartet and nonet form at venues and festivals including the world-famous Ronnie Scott’s jazz club in Soho and Celtic Connections in Glasgow.