"All of our pieces have as many stories as they have listeners." (VIRTA on "About to Fly" & Cadenza)

Post-jazz group VIRTA is a contributor to Half Mystic Journal’s fifth issue, cadenza. Their modern instrumental sound may cause jazz purists and traditionalists to cringe, but their music, combining elements from multiple genres such as post-rock and electronica, has proven to be a hit with a diverse audience in their native Finland.

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We asked three of our Issue V contributors to share with us their personal definitions of cadenza: how it is formed, where it has been, what it could be. Here is VIRTA's vision of the saxophone laugh – the air of smoke & blue – the love affair as old-fashioned as it is timeless…

The way we compose our music is by the three of us improvising together. With this piece we first found the drum beat and quickly after the guitar chords and the trumpet melody came up for the main theme. After this we named the piece and from this point the music took the lead and we just followed where it would take us.

For me our music is mostly abstract visions and feelings. I think the meaning of this piece and all of our music depends when and where and by whom it is being listened. Everyone reflects the emotions they get from the music to their own experiences of life. All of our pieces have as many stories as they have listeners.

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VIRTA's song “About to Fly”, along with twenty other pieces by contributors and two columns by the Half Mystic team, are compiled in Half Mystic Journal’s Issue V: Cadenza, a stunning collection of contemporary art, lyrics, and writing celebrating swing jazz and tapping feet, midnight on cobblestoned streets, drunken solo out a three-story window, drowsy night and clumsy dance, serenade with the stars as a microphone. It is available for preorder now.