The Squid's Ear Magazine


Lisbon String Trio & Carlos Zingaro: Theia (Creative Sources)

Adding a fourth string to the collaborations of Portugal's Lisbon String Trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Miguel Mira on cello, and Alvaro Rosso on contrabass, Portuguese violinist Carlos Zingaro adds an additional level of delicately complex interplay to the trio's exceptional free improvisation, as they pay tribute to the Greek goddess of light and extent.
 

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Personnel:



Ernesto Rodrigues-viola

Miguel Mira-cello

Alvaro Rosso-double bass

Carlos Zingaro-violin


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UPC: 5609063405200

Label: Creative Sources
Catalog ID: cs520
Squidco Product Code: 25800

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2018
Country: Portugal
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded live at Lisboa Incomumon, in Lisbon, Portugal, on March 2nd, 2018, by Carlos Santos.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"[...] Theia is an album that I had expected to enjoy, with legendary violinist Carlos Zingaro joining the Lisbon String Trio for the eighth of what is so far a series of a nine albums, again recorded live (in Lisbon this March). (Expectations are always dangerous, but they seem to have worked out in this case....)

I don't know if Zingaro has performed together with Ernesto Rodrigues in the past, but this is the first document, as far as I know, and with a title evoking Titanic collision: Theia is anything but an album of polarity & broad epic sweep, however, as it's often "moving in so many directions at once that it involves a sort of hide & seek for the listener," per the earlier remarks. Zingaro's participation suggests a direct comparison with Chant, another (relatively recent) album featuring the "jazz string quartet," but with (classical) marimba as well: Chant often adopts a rather classical mood, and indeed does develop something of a "sweep" at times, as counterpoint builds continuity & even lushness. (Chant has suggested for me a polarity between naturalistic sounds & their mediations and the industrial-technological world of modernity & indeed musical instruments. It comes to sound more distinctly classical, even biographical, over time.)

Whereas both Chant & Theia could be said to revolve around viola players, Cròniques 5: Ao vivo! is another recent (recorded in Portugal last October) album to note, albeit short: Cròniques takes us back to Discordian Records of Barcelona - per my comments on Inner Core last week - and Ao vivo! is apparently the climax of a series by tenor sax player Albert Cirera - mentioned here in January around Agustí Fernández & The Liquid Trio Plays Bernoulli - a quintet album coming after a series of four duo outings with each of the other participants. Not only does the latter group include Zingaro, but bassist Alvaro Rosso of Lisbon String Trio as well, plus Ulrich Mitzlaff (cellist on Chant) & Olle Vikström (with whom I was not previously familiar) on baritone sax. Ao vivo! has some fine moments, and suggests a "gathering of forces" in a style that's become associated with Barcelona, developing a herky-jerky composite rhythmic ostinato or groove.

Meanwhile, Theia moves in many directions at once, both within & between its six well-defined tracks, not so much suggesting aimlessness as an intense web of precise & growing connections via harmonics, double stops, interpolations, etc. It's not so much a matter of pace, as that's relatively moderate, but the contrapuntal branching & sense of relation is relentless, quickly filling the mind: In this, it recalls for me not the Boulez of Répons, per the previous entry, but of Dérive 2 - my favorite of his late works, employing only a string trio (i.e. no bass) among its eleven conventional instruments (without electronics, etc.). Dérive 2 also fills the mind quickly with its branching relations, and requires sharp concentration on its close interactions.

Theia, likewise, almost seems to be more active the more one attends to it, in keeping with its relentless tracing of connections. (It can seem very potent, even spicy, and yet withdraws or hides without much attention, not so unlike Sîn - although I don't believe that anyone would characterize Theia as ambient.) Theia might even be said to track some of the same naturalistic-technological duality as Chant, although with its own flair, as the connectedness of humanity per se to anything & everything else becomes increasingly apparent (and, in this case, is criss-crossed by an even broader variety of relations). Does this "everything else" include "outer space?"

In contrast to some of my preferences (especially as articulated, perhaps overly strongly, in my response to Autres Paysages - also from João Camões of Chant, as it happens), Theia undertakes a relation with "space" not by evoking previous traditions of "spacey music" or even imagery of NASA & technological space exploration/exploitation, but via a mythological "Clash of the Titans" & even suggestions of originary planetary collision. (Theia was chosen as the Titan to name a hypothetical planetary body posited as involved in creating our moon via celestial collision.) (Coluro likewise invokes the planetary, although perhaps not "space" per se, in a precise yet non-astronaut centered mode. One might even say that it decenters the human more generally, or perhaps even recenters it.)

And these are all real human ideas, of one sort or another, such that we are all somehow enmeshed in this multifaceted web, from primordial planetary motion to classical string technique & evocations of the broader sonic environment.... Moreover, the intricacy of Theia makes it difficult or even impossible to pull away from these connections, to gain a (desired?) perspective of distance, i.e. of non-involvement: It thwarts illusions of mastery from within its embedded relationality, and often does so rather starkly. (That was a comment about life in general, right? It might also apply to Geometry of Caves....) Stability & insight are infrequent within such a space, but they do sometimes pool, however briefly, in eddies.... 23 July 2018."-Todd McComb's Jazz Thoughts


Get additional information at Todd McComb's Jazz Thoughts

Artist Biographies

"He has been playing the violin for 30 years and in that time has played all genres of music ranging from contemporary music to free jazz and improvised music, live and in the studio.

His main interest shifted towards contemporary improvised and composed music.

The relationship with his instruments is focused in sonic and textural elements.

Electronic music was an early influence on his approach to violin playing, which challenges traditional romantic concepts of the violin/viola through use of preparations and micro tuning.

Active in different settings on the Portuguese scene for free improvised music, both as a collaborator and in leading his own groups.

Music for Dance, Cinema, Video and Performance.

Has created the record label Creative Sources Recordings in 1999, which mainly concentrates on releasing experimental and electro-acoustic music."

-Creative Sources (http://creativesourcesrec.com/creative_artists.html)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Born in 1958, studying guitar at the Academy of Music Amateurs, in the 70s, with Prof. Nagy. In the late 70 studying bass at the Hot Club, in the early '80s, with Prof. Zé Eduardo.

"Intrigue and permanent and persistent unease with stringed instruments, jazz and improvisation itself. During the last forty years, in concert, in private or in the studio, I had the honor of having played and learned (chronologically) Nuno Grande, Armindo Neves, Emilio Robalo, Celso Carvalho, António Ferro, Arthur Costa, Ze Bitch John Vinegar, John Lucas, Francisco Medina, Abdul moimeme, Rashiim Ausar Sahu, Patrick Brennan, Rodrigo Amado, Scott Fields, Francisco Trindade, Ernesto Rodrigues, Harvey Sorgen and Joe Giardullo.

Today, honor me play (and perpetuate my restlessness) with Rodrigo Amado, Abdul moimeme, John Lucas, Joseph Bruno Parrinha, John Parrinha, João Pedro Viegas, Alipio Carvalho Neto, Gabriel Ferrandini, Ernesto Rodrigues, Armando Gonçalves Pereira, Hernani Faustino, Rodrigo Pinheiro, Zé Lencastre, Louis Desirat, Peter Castello Lopes, Luís Lopes, Luís Vicente, Philip Sousa, Pedro Roxo, Johannes Krieger, George Lamprey, Marcello Maggi, Paulo Curado, Diogo Leal, D' Incise, Virginia and Eduardo Chagas. With some of my friends. I share my musical day in broader bands or ensembles, with other I highlight specific musical encounters and they are my entire curriculum." "

-JACC Records (http://www.jacc-records.com/en/musicians/miguel-mira)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

Alvaro Rosso is a Portuguese double bassist, a member of Variable Geometry Orchestra, ZMVR 4tet, Orgonite, Croniques 3, and String Theory.

-Squidco 3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Carlos Zíngaro (or Carlos "Zíngaro" Alves, born 1948 in Lisbon, Portugal) is a Portuguese violinist and electronic musician active in free improvisation.

He studied classical music in Lisbon and began working with a number of leading improvisers in the mid-1970s, becoming one of the European top improvisers presently. He has worked with such musicians as Richard Teitelbaum, Joëlle Léandre, Peter Kowald, Barre Phillips, Daunik Lazro, Derek Bailey, Jon Rose, Ken Vandermark, Ken Filiano, Rodrigo Amado, Ned Rothenberg, Rüdiger Carl, Dominique Regef, Evan Parker, Annick Nozati, Theo Jörgensmann and Paul Lovens.

Zíngaro has performed at new and improvised music festivals in Europe, Asia, and North America, produced several film scores, and collaborated with dance companies.

He is also a prolific illustrator and comics author."

-Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Zingaro)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Untitled 9:18

2. Untitled 5:24

3. Untitled 5:35

4. Untitled 7:21

5. Untitled 7:49

6. Untitled 6:48

Related Categories of Interest:


Creative Sources
Improvised Music
Free Improvisation
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Quartet Recordings
Stringed Instruments
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