Peter Maxymych (at about age 30) playing accordion 
in his jazz trio that frequently played around Montreal.

Maxymych spent much of his youth playing accordion in jazz bands that appeared throughout the Montreal, Canada area. Though he later moved on to business pursuits, including domain investing and development, he never lost his passion for music. That led to him bringing a group of world class jazz musicians together at Montreal's Studio 270 in July 2011. For Maxymych, it was purely a labor of love but it blossomed into much more than that.

Peter said he had just wanted to "recreate a sound that was heard in clubs and other venues in the 1960s and 70s. The accordion was the lead instrument in those groups and the music was inspired by Art Van Damme, who led a quintet with vibes, guitar, bass and drums."

Maxymych was able to do that by lining up Kenny Kotwitz on accordion, Steve Hobbs on vibraphone (and also handling arrangements), Greg Clayton on guitar, Dave Laing on drums, Alec Walkington on bass and John Labelle on vocals. 

NAJA was born and by the time they had laid down 12 tracks even Maxymych was blown away by what he heard. He decided the tapes were worth shopping around and sure enough two major jazz labels fell in love with the sound too. 

Photo of Peter Maxymych that appears
in the booklet for The North American Jazz 
Alliance's new CD The Montreal Sessions

Though Peter's first attempt to produce a full-length jazz album turned out better than he could have dreamed, he is not about to abandon his rapidly growing domain business any time soon. His company, Emall.ca, owns over 7,000 .CA domains including such generic gems as Loans.ca, Ticket.ca, Christmas.ca, Dating.ca, eand Recipes.ca, the latter domain having now been developed into a major website in a joint venture with Kenneth Maclean (formerly of Canwest). 

Maxymych told me that Emall.ca is getting more focused on the development of sites as the next progression of their business. Their developed sites already include HockeyTickets.ca, CheapTickets.ca and eTickets.ca. As you might expect with the National Hockey League's player strike having just ended and an abbreviated season scheduled to begin a few days from now, HockeyTickets.ca is seeing a particularly large surge in traffic. 

eTickets.ca has a broader base, offering tickets for virtually all sports, including the NFL and NBA, as well as entertainment tickets to shows and events on Broadway, in Las Vegas and at other venues. With his new CD out, Maxymych may want to think about gearing up for North American Jazz Alliance concert ticket sales next!