The Squid's Ear Magazine


Hydra Ensemble (Almeida / Hitz / Gregov / Zuydervelt): Vistas (A New Wave of Jazz)

The second album from the Hydra Ensemble (Goncalo Almeida on double bass, Lucija Gregov on cello, Nina Hitz on cello, Rutger Zuydervelt on electronics) is a live recording with no audience from the Worm club in Rotterdam during the pandemic, reaching deeper into their masterful world of darkly intense chamber improv and electronics, slowly yielding to a spaciously brighter ending.
 

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Personnel:



Goncalo Almeida-double bass

Lucija Gregov-cello

Nina Hitz-cello

Rutger Zuydervelt-electronics


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Label: A New Wave of Jazz
Catalog ID: nwoj0051
Squidco Product Code: 32129

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2022
Country: Belgium
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded at Worm, in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, on April 16th, 2021, by Vincent Denieul.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"The Hydra Ensemble is a pan-European quartet featuring Croatian cellist Lucija Gregov, Swiss cellist Nina Hitz, Portuguese double bass player Gonçalo Almeida and Dutch electronics wizard Rutger Zuydervelt (known also as Machinefabriek), All are working in the Netherlands and all with different musical backgrounds and interests but determined to stress how intertwined some presumably distinct music genres have become in their daring free improvised dynamics. The music of the Hydra Ensemble constantly and effortlessly shape-shifting between chamber contemporary music, free improvisation, sonic exploration, experimental electronics and anything between, and highlights the versatility of the four musicians.

Vistas is the sophomore album of this quartet, following Voltas (Inexhaustible Editions, 2021), and it was recorded live at the Worm club in Rotterdam during the Covid-19 pandemic (without an audience, but streamed live) in April 2021. The first "Vistas" is a cinematic and unsettling, chamber drone piece. Almeida's double bass sets its pulsating heartbeat, Gregov and Hinz's cellos build the tension with heavy, resonant layers of sound and texture, and Zuydervelt acts as agent provocateur with his disruptive yet subtle and clever palette of electronics.

The following pieces deepen the dark, melancholic spirit of "Vistas" and its fragile, patient and detailed dynamics. On the third "Vista", Zuydervelt's electronics charge the sonic searches of Almeida, Gregov and Hinz with their intense demonstration of extended bowing techniques with suggestive tension. The tension intensifies even more in the trance-like, mysterious ritual of the fourth "Vista". The fifth and the last "Vista" offers a more playful and optimist interplay with the ironic electronics of Zuydervelt, emphasizing again the fascinating, open sonic vision of this ensemble."-Eyal Hareuveni, Salt Peanuts


Get additional information at Salt Peanuts

Artist Biographies

"Gonçalo Almeida born in 1978 Lisbon, Portugal. Lives in Rotterdam, Netherlands, where he followed studies at Rotterdams Conservatorium, having studied with Heyn van Geyn, Stefan Lievestro, Marius Beets and Peter Leerdman, finishing his master degree in 2008.

Plays in a variety of projects that go from modern jazz, freejazz, jazzcore and free improvisation music, having shared the stage with improvisers such has Chris Speed, Carlos Zíngaro, Wilbert de Joode, Martin van Duynhoven, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Rodrigo Amado, Tobias Klein, Jasper Stadhouders among others.

Also has been working in collaboration with multi media such as video artists, modern dancers, poets, and theater makers.

In the main projects that he is involved as double bass player, he has a deep input as a composer."

-Goncalo Almeida Website (http://gonzobass.wixsite.com/gonzoalmeida/biography)
3/13/2024

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

"Lucija Gregov is a cellist, improviser and artist whose work describes and explores new sonic landscapes. Adding to her instrumental cello practice, she integrates analogue synthesizers and processed field recordings to her compositions. Her visceral approach to improvisation proposes a distinctive way of creating, co-creating, thinking and performing in and about current sonic dynamic. Following indicators of flow, experimentation, investigation of unexplored physical and spiritual spaces, Lucija's work enables emergence of practice and sound materials that are open-ended and continuously transformative.

Through many interdisciplinary collaborations, she seeks to push the boundaries of traditional cello playing which further extend her interpretation, technique and ideas. She has been developing projects and researching in the field of classical music, electro acoustic music, noise, improvisation, experimental music, radio and sound art, as well as community art.

She is an active member of 'RE#SISTER' collective, 'Hydra Ensemble', 'Batavierhuis', 'Ma' and creator and curator of Sonosphere radio programme and live events series at WORM, Rotterdam. Her research work titled 'Liquid Artist' is an ongoing exploration on intersection of art, social science and philosophy and it contains thoughts, facts, subjective opinions and analysis of collected materials related to themes of flow, hierarchy, idealism, connectedness and inherited meaning."

-Lucija Gregov @ Hotglue (https://lugregov.hotglue.me/)
3/13/2024

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

"Nina Hitz was born in Switzerland and is currently living in The Netherlands. She finished her graduate studies in Baroque cello at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague.

A very active, questing spirit who constantly seeks the unknown in life and in music, in addition to baroque music, Hitz is active with experimental music, improvisation and theatrical performances.

She is a member of Belfontis, with fortepiano player Kaoru Iwamura. The trio specialises in early romantic music. She also performs with Traces and Resonances, with dancer Sato Endo, and Jargon (led byMaurice Horsthuis).

She has played in theater- and dance productions of Orkater, Olivier Provily, Het Barre Land, Scapino Ballet Rotterdam, les Ballets C de la B, Opera2Day and piano quintet SOUNDS."

-The Scroll Ensemble (https://www.thescrollensemble.com/en/about-us/ensemble-members/nina-hitz-cello/)
3/13/2024

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

"Machinefabriek is the alias of Rutger Zuydervelt. Rutger's music combines elements of ambient, noise, minimalism, drone, field recordings and electro-acoustic experiments. His pieces can be heard as an attempt to create sonic environments for the listener to dwell in. Finding tension in texture, tone and timing, the result can be very minimalistic at first glance, but reveals itself upon closer listening. The devil is in the details.

Rutger was born in 1978 in Apeldoorn (The Netherlands) and now resides in Rotterdam. He started recording as Machinefabriek in 2004. After a series of self released cd-rs, his official debut Marijn was issued in 2006, with great critical acclaim. Since than, a solid stream of music was released on labels such as Type, Important, Home Normal, 12K, Entr'acte, Dekorder, Miasmah, Consouling Sounds, Experimedia and Staalplaat. He performed all over the globe, from Canada to Israel and from Russia to Japan.

Rutger collaborated (on record and/or live) with numerous artists, such as Steinbrüchel, Jaap Blonk, Aaron Martin, Peter Broderick, Frans de Waard, Mats Gustafsson, Steve Roden, Gareth Davis, Stephen Vitiello, Michel Banabila, Dirk Serries and Dead Neanderthals, amongst many others.

He frequently works with film makers, like Makino Takashi, Mike Hoolboom, John Price, Paul Clipson and Chris Teerink, for whom he composed a soundtrack for his documentary about Sol LeWitt. Rutger also recorded the music for the Canadian drama The Cold and the Quiet from 2014. Furthermore, his music was used in Edward Burtynsky's Watermark, the drama Stone (with Robert DeNiro and Edward Norton) and Josh Fox' influential Gasland and Gasland Part II documentaries. Besides films, Rutger also composes music for dance pieces, like Alix Eynaudi and Kris Verdonck's EXIT (premiéred at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin), Alexander Whitley's The Measures Taken (for the Royal Opera in London) and Beheld (for Candoco Dance Company), and multiple pieces by Spanish/Dutch choreographer Iván Pérez. Then there's Rutgers installation work, in which the dialogue with the environment plays an important role. He did projects for Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, NAi (Dutch Architecture Institute), the new Armando Museum MOA, Sounds Like Audio Art in Saskatoon (Canada), the Into the Great Wide Open Festival, Netwerk in Aalst (Belgium) and children's museum Villa Zebra in Rotterdam."

-Machinefabriek Website (http://www.machinefabriek.nu/about/biography)
3/13/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Vista I 10:16

2. Vista II 10:03

3. Vista III 11:27

4. Vista V 07:34

5. Vista IV 10:11

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Free Improvisation
Electro-Acoustic
Electro-Acoustic Improv
Collective Free Improvsation
Stringed Instruments
Electronic Forms
Quartet Recordings
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
New in Improvised Music
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Staff Picks & Recommended Items

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A New Wave of Jazz.


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