Reviews of the Classic Jass Ensemble of Valery Kiselyov
"Throughout the festival the audience preferred to stay seated, but as soon as the Classic Jazz Ensemble of saxophonist Valery Kiselyov together with American singer Dennis Rowland entered the stage, a dancing crowd immediately took up the whole space in front of the stage. They performed famous pieces by Lester Young, Count Basie, Nat Adderley : This is really what a gala finale for an open-air festival should look like."
Culture Portal, 12th September 2007.
10th International "Jazz at Hermitage Garden" Festival.
"Valery Kiselyov reveals not just a virtuosity, but also a deeply up-to-date musical thinking, which leaves him no competitors among our jazz clarinetists..."
Alexey Kolosov (annotation to the "Sign of Blues" CD produced by "Melody")
"Oleg Lundstrem's orchestra was very lucky to have superb musicians like Valery Kiselyov..."
"Passport in the New World" magazine
"Valery Kiselyov is a musician with a fine sense of ensemble; his improvisations show good taste and moderation. He is simply a splendid clarinetist."
Alexey Batashev
"Valery Kiselyov became famous as the brilliant leading saxophone in the big bands of Anatoly Kroll and Oleg Lundstrem, as well as a solo clarinetist."
Vladimir Feiertag "Jazz ХХ century" (Encyclopedia/Reference book)
"The Classic Jazz Ensemble of Valery Kiselyov is one of the most stylistically accurate and musically rich bands in the capital, exploring the swing jazz tradition."
"FULL JAZZ" Weekly online magazine 2005
"The legend of Russian jazz in Kazan"
"Valery Kiselyov is one of the best Russian masters of jazz clarinet and saxophone. Many years of active work have helped Valery become what he is nowadays - a virtuoso performer with a remarkably expressive style."
"EVENING KAZAN"
18th December 2002
"ECHOES OF HARLEM"
"Now a bit of chronicles from the "real" Moscow. 9th March 1999. Chaikovsky hall. The last concert of the 98/99 season, Subscription N 52, hosted by Vladimir Feiertag, comprised two separate performances dedicated to Duke Ellington. The first part included Ellington's tunes performed by a very original and very musical duet: Valery Kiselyov (clarinet, saxophones) and Evgeny Pechnikov (piano). Surprisingly enough, such hits as Caravan, C-jam blues, Sophisticated Lady and others were deliberately left out in favor of some lesser-known but equally worthy pieces of the "Great Duke". Yet to finish off their performance the duet played a medley of the classical Ellington pieces, after which they gave two encores."
"FULL JAZZ" 1999
"Jazz on Volga. Nine days of a year, or where "the trumpet calls us" In the end there were eternal masterpieces performed by the Classic Jazz Ensemble of the brilliant clarinetist and saxophonist Valery Kiselyov, who started back in the 70s in the orchestras of Anatoly Kroll and Oleg Lundstrem. The band includes tenorist Evgeny Pechnikov, vibraphonist Anatoly Tekuchev, guitarist Vladimir Frolov, contrabassist Sergey Geyer and percussionist Pavel Timofeev. "Moonlight Serenade" - that's what Kiselyov called his program. It is made up of 3-4 minutes long "American diamonds" of the past with a "Russian" culmination (Song of the Volga Boatmen) and a "false" finale: a calm and lyrical theme by Enrico Madriquera (arr. J. Gray) Adios, which presented all the musicians, was suddenly interrupted by In the Mood."
Olga Korzhova ("JAZZ QUADRATE" 2007)
Translation to English by Maria Zotova.