The Squid's Ear Magazine


Fernandez, Agusti / Rafal Mazur: Correspondence With No Words (Not Two)

Barcelona pianist Agustí Fernández and Polish bass guitarist Rafał Mazur correspond through solo tracks recorded in their respective studios, each missive an unusual and impressive free improvisation using extended techniques, inside playing and inexplicable exclamation, in a five-part exchange where each message is alternately addressed "Dear Agusti" and "Dear Rafał".
 

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Agusti Fernandez-piano

Rafal Mazur-bass guitar


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UPC: 5906395187850

Label: Not Two
Catalog ID: MW 1024
Squidco Product Code: 31518

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2021
Country: Poland
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Tracks 1, 3 and 5 recorded at Estudi les Orenetes, Sant Pere de Vilamajor, in Barcelona, Spain, by Agusti Fernandez; Track 7 and 9 recored at Estudi Rosazul, in Barcelona, Spain, by Ferran Conangla; Tracks 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 recorded at DTS Studio, in Krakow, Poland, by Rafal Drewniany.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

Barcelona pianist Agustí Fernández and Polish bass guitarist Rafał Mazur correspond through solo tracks recorded in their respective studios, each missive an unusual and impressive free improvisation using extended techniques, inside playing and inexplicable exclamation, in a five-part exchange where each message is alternately addressed "Dear Agusti" and "Dear Rafał".


Artist Biographies

"Agustí Fernández (Palma de Mallorca, 1954), with a perfectly based career and a well-deserved international reputation, is one of the Spanish musicians of major international projection and a world reference in the field of improvised music. Fernández has worked with famous musicians of the free improvisation scene like Peter Kowald, Derek Bailey, Butch Morris, Evan Parker, Barry Guy, Mats Gustafsson, Joel Ryan and Peter Evans a.m.o. He is a member of the Blue Shroud Band, Mats Gustafsson NU Ensemble and Barry Guy New Orquestra. Up to the current date he has published more than 80 CD's

He has also worked with the recognised composer of contemporary music Héctor Parra, who composed in collaboration with the pianist FREC, a solo for expanded piano. FREC has been premiered at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in 2013 with the collaboration of the video artist Lucas Caraba. He has conducted various improvised music ensembles like Ad Libitum Ensemble (Varsaw), Free Art Ensemble (Barcelona), Ansambl Studio 6 (Lujbljana) Orquesta FOCO (Madrid), Entenguerengue (Jérez de la Frontera), Impromtu Ensemble (Valencia), etc.

Along his professional life Agustí Fernández has received much recognition. His solo for piano "Mutza" presented in New York in 2007 was distinguished by the New York magazine AllAboutJazz as one of 10 best concerts from that year. The CD "Un llamp que no s'acaba mai" on PSI (Agustí Fernández, John Edwards and Mark Sanders) has been distinguished by Allaboutjazz as one of the best 10 cd's in 2009; the CD "Aurora" on Maya Recordings (Agustí Fernandez, Barry Guy and Ramón López) was selected by Cuadernos de Jazz magazine as the best CD in 2007, by the Jaç magazine as the best fourth disc of the history of the Catalan jazz and it was Disc d'émoi (February, 2007) for the French Jazz Magazine. The "Agustí Fernández Aurora Trio" received the second prize at the BMW Welt Jazz Award 2012 celebrated in Münich, Germany. In 2000 he received the Festival Altaveu Award, Sant Boi de Llobregat (Catalonia). In 2001 he received the FAD - Sebastià Guasch Award, Barcelona (Cataluña) with Andrés Corchero por el or the performance "A modo de esperanza". In 2011 Agustí Fernández was the main character of the documentary film "Los dedos huéspedes" by Lucas Caraba, which has been screened in several international festivals of documentary. In 2014 the Ad Libitum Festival (Warsaw) dedicated a monographic edition to celebrate Fernández's 60th Birthday.

He's professor of improvised music at the Escuela Superior de Música de Catalunya (ESMUC). He's developing an important teaching activity in the field of improvised music and, among other, he has been teaching in IRCAM in Paris, the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre de Tallin, the Royal Conservatory in The Hague (Holland), the Conservatory in Arhem (Holland), the Taller de Músicos in Gijón (Spain), the Taller de Músics in Barcelona (Spain) and the Conservatorio Superior de Música in Salamanca (Spain)."

-Agusti Fernandez Website (http://www.agustifernandez.com/biografia/)
12/11/2024

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

"Rafal Mazur's involvement with music began in his youth with violoncello studies in Krakow. He switched to bass guitar in the late 1980's. Since 2000 he has played an acoustic bass guitar built to his own specifications by luthier Jerzy Wysocki. He has developed an advanced and individual approach to his instrument, and to improvisation in general, in which sonority, extended technique and gesture combine effortlessly in performance. He has taken an important role in Kraków to support young artists and improvised music. A founder of the ImproArt studio of improvisation, he has performed jazz and improvised music in clubs and festivals across Poland and Europe, and in China, South Korea and Israel. In recent years he has collaborated with Lisa Ullen, Frederic Blondy, Charlotta Hug, Raymond Strid, Keir Neuringer, Zsolt Sores and others. His current focus is the band "Ensemble 56" and "Mazur/Neuringer Duo". He is an organizer of the Laboratory of Intuition, a series of spontaneous art presentations in Kraków. Mazur's main field of interest and activity is collective and solo free/spontaneous improvisation. In his practice as an improvising musician and on his way to mastery/artistry he studys Chinese philosophy (Jagiellonian University). He regards Taoism as a strong base for the enrichment of the improviser's attitude, and to this end he practices the Taoist's martial art TaiJi Quan Chen. For Mazur, following the masters of Chinese philosophy and martial arts is crucial in the development of a state of mind prepared for the unexpected situations an improviser encounters in the act of collective free improvisation. During the Polish Sound Art in China tour in 2006, Mazur presented lectures in NiHiLo Gallery in Foshan and Zendai Art Museum in Shanghai, taking the opportunity to meet Chinese improvisers and discuss and compare his approaches to improvisation, Taoism and TaiJi. Mazur's most recent work is the first album of solo acoustic bass guitar free improvisation: 'Sonor Forms'. Released by independent label DTS Records in Krakow on its Transidiomatic series, the disc is the result of investigation into the practice of solo free improvisation."

-Rafal Mazur Website (http://www.rafalmazur.eu/1bio.html)
12/11/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Dear Rafal 1 4:45

2. Dear Agusti 1 5:12

3. Dear Rafal 2 5:36

4. Dear Agusti 2 5:38

5. Dear Rafal 3 6:06

6. Dear Agusti 3 4:58

7. Dear Rafal 4 7:15

8. Dear Agusti 4 6:39

9. Dear Rafal 5 3:41

10. Dear Agusti 5 3:17

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Jazz
Free Improvisation
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms

Guitarists, &c.
Piano & Keyboards

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