02 / THE STORY
What remains
is music.
A personal tribute to Riza Bekirov, told in the language father and son always shared.
For Ukrainian Crimean Tatar pianist, composer and bandleader Usein Bekirov, music has always been an inheritance. His father, Riza Bekirov, was the first person to open that world to him; a classically trained cellist and pianist whose own work in ethno-jazz helped shape his son’s understanding of what music could carry across generations, cultures and borders.
When Riza passed away in the spring of 2026, Bekirov returned to the language they had always shared. The result is Dedication, a deeply personal new album that transforms grief into an expansive meditation on memory, cultural identity and the ways music allows those we lose to continue speaking through us.
Produced by Randy Jackson, Robert L. Smith and Victoria Kohana, Dedication brings Bekirov together with a formidable international cast of musicians, including Vinnie Colaiuta, Chris Dave, Hadrien Feraud, Keyon Harrold, Kenneth Whalum, Rick Braun, Eric Marienthal, Yakiv Tsvietinskyi, Wayne Escoffery, Bar Filipowicz and David Hawkins.