| The band members met each other in mid-2002 in the City Café club. Ivan has sung a few jazz and soul covers with a group consisting of, among others, Łukasz Lazer and Wojciech ‘Olo’ Olszewski.
After a few months of playing cover tracks in Warsaw clubs (such as City Café, Neo Café and Panorama in the Hotel Marriott), Ivan, Łukasz and Olo decided to start working on a repertoire of their own and named the group Ivan & Delfin. It took a few months to write the music (which was Łukasz' & Olo’s job) and the lyrics (Ivan and Michał Szymański’s). Finally, in September 2003, the band entered the Spaart studio in Boguchwała near Rzeszów and recorded the entire album.
The album was released by a friendly record company – Team Design – and hit the shops in March 2004. Earlier, in October 2003, the song ‘Jej Czarne Oczy’ (‘Her Black Eyes’) had been released and played on all the radio stations in Poland. It became a hit among all the stations that had decided to promote a song from such an unknown and independent band.
In January, the track ended up on the compilation of Dee Jay Mix Club, a major organization that unites hundreds of clubs and DJs in Poland. It also reigned in the discotheques, dance clubs and became a summer holiday smash hit. The band had found fame despite the flimsy distribution of the album and the boycott performed by large commercial radio stations.
In June, the band joined with manager Krzysztof Bogucki, whose widespread connections with clubs and discotheques resulted in loads of concert propositions.
Since June 2004, Ivan & Delfin have performed several dozen shows around the country. ‘Jej Czarne Oczy’ has also had overseas success and became a big hit in Polish radio stations in the USA. So the band visited the United States twice, performing in New York, New Jersey, Chicago and Detroit. Today the song ‘Sto Lat Niech Żyje Miłość’ is a big hit in those radio stations, and clubs in the Polish community.
In February 2005, the album was re-issued with a new visual design and slightly different musical content. Krzysztof Bogucki’s record company - Impressariat – is taking care of the release, while the extremely energetic Magic Records is doing the distribution.
The band has made two videos – ‘Jej Czarne Oczy’ and the Eurovision song ‘Czarna Dziewczyna’. The video for ‘Sto Lat Niech Żyje Miłość’ is being made.
Ivan & Delfin have appeared in many TV shows, such as ‘Randka W Ciemno’ (the Polish version of ‘Blind Date’), ‘Kawa Czy Herbata’ (a journalistic programme), Stratosfera (a music programme that features Polish stars) and many others.
The vocalist Ivan Komarenko is also in the most popular TV series in Poland (‘M Jak Miłość’). He is a very outspoken person and has starred in many magazines and TV shows. |
