Sketches of Corsica: the radiant lyric trumpet of Paolo Fresu glides across the massed voices of A Filetta, the singers who are both trailblazers and keepers of tradition in the realm of Corsican polyphony. The ancient and the experimental blend seamlessly in these compositions, several of them written by ensemble founder Jean-Claude Acquaviva, who has directed the singing group for more than 30 years. A powerful showing here also for Italian bandoneon innovator Daniele do Bonaventura, who contributes new music, solos imaginatively, duets with Fresu, and envelops voices and trumpet with an almost orchestral sense of form.
Mistico Mediterraneo
Paolo Fresu, A Filetta Corsican Voices, Daniele di Bonaventura
- 1Rex tremendae
05:00 - 2Liberata
05:23 - 3Da tè à mè
05:08 - 4Le lac
06:39 - 5Dies irae
05:15 - 6Gloria
04:24 - 7Corale
03:45 - 8La folie du Cardinal
01:46 - 9U sipolcru
04:38 - 10Scherzi veranili
02:54 - 11Figliolu d'ella
04:21 - 12Gradualis
02:29 - 13Sanctus
04:42
A stunning recording that takes on a life of ist own. This release is far more than a “recording” it is an “experience”… Hauntingly Beautiful…
Brent Logan Black, Digital jazz news
Mistico Mediterraneo ist genau das, was der Titel verspricht: Musik vom Mittelmeer, die tief in archaischen Gesangstraditionen wurzelt und aus sakraler Innigkeit, Chormusik des 20. Jahrhunderts und stmosphärischen Filmmusikelementen eine mystische Stimmung heraufbeschwört.
Jazzthetik
Se fondant en une même respiration, ces trois esthétiques, entre jazz, folk et musique de chambre, composent un répertoire qui sonne comme un chant sacré.
La vie
True to the title, the musical goods here wax mystical and Mediterranean and are brushed throughout with graceful melancholy. Although our ears latch onto Fresu’s singular sound on trumpet (electronically affected, with mute and without) and flugelhorn, the pieces in the 13-part song cycle were composed by others, including A Filetta founder Jean-Claude Acquaviva and Di Bonaventura. Remarkably, this synthesis pulls our ears and minds in multiple directions while offering an impressively focused aesthetic.
Josef Woodard, Jazz Times
Quand les sublimes polyphonies vocales d’A Filetta croisent la trompette solaire de Paolo Fresu et le bandonéon clair-obscur de Daniele di Bonaventura, la rencontre ne peut qu’engendrer un chef-d’œuvre.
L.S., 24heures
The wheeze and clack of Italian bandoneón (squeezebox) player Daniele di Bonaventura’s instrument sets up a depp drone, from which the sighing lament of A Filetta’s male voices rises in a powerful unison. A sparingly applied halo of electronics and the burnished purity of Sardinian jazz trumpeter Paolo Fresu circles the mix, framed by an effortlessly airy ECM recording.
Andrew McGregor, Songlines
Die eigentlichen Stars auf “Mistico Mediterraneo sind jedoch die Sänger von A Filetta. Bodenständig, in der Tradition der Vokal-Polyphonie der Mittelmeerinsel verwurzelt, aber je nach Lage der Winde stets neuen Richtungen zuneigend, suchen A Filetta nach Wegen, eine einzigartige, bis in die Antike zurückreichende Form des Gesangs in der Gegenwart zu verankern. Mit Hilfe der lyrischen Gravität von Fresus Trompete und der süßen Melancholie des Bandoneons verwandeln sich die 13 ebenso säkularen wie sakralen Lieder in eine Art musikalisches Über-Ich. (…) Triumph einer Musik, die wohldosiert aus den Zeitströmen schöpft und gleichermaßen Bauch, Herz und Kopf entspringt.
Reinhard Köchl, Jazzthing
“Mistico Mediterraneo” puise au plus profond de l’âme. Promenade intérieure, réflexion intime, sonorités envoûtantes, l’album est une des belles surprises de ce début d’année. On y respire l’essence meme de la Corse secrete comme en fusionne avec la trompette de Paolo Fresu, qui se meut d’une plage musicale à l’autre, tout en douceur et tout en profondeur.
La Dépèche
Graceful and mesmerizing, this lovely and haunting collaboration among Sardinia native trumpet player Paolo Fresu, bandoneon player Daniele di Bonaventura and the Corsican polyphonic vocal ensemble A Filetta is mysterious and haunting.
Ellis Widner, Arkansas Democraty Gazette
„Mistico Mediterrano“ ist eine superbe Überraschung, ein exzellent inszeniertes Experiment mit der korsischen Vokalgruppe A Filetta und dem folkloristisch verwurzelten Bandoneonspieler Daniele di Bonaventura. […] Kompositionen und Texte knüpfen an sakrale und säkulare Gesangstraditionen Korsikas an, Vergangenheit wird Gegenwart, vermittelt durch Bandoneon und Fresus sehr lyrisch gespielter Trompete. Polyphone Vokalparts und weit ausholende Improvisationen verschmelzen zu einem irritierenden und faszinierendem Ganzen – mal Gebet, mal vom Alltag inspiriert.
Heribert Ickerott, Jazzpodium
Évocatrices des polyphonies insulaires, de la musique de chambre et du Miles évanescent, leurs harmonies lancinantes charrient l’émotion des requiem.
Éric Delhaye, Vibrations
Few labels (if any) can boast such an impressive catalogue of sconstant innovation, where unfailing respect for tradition is matched by an equal disregard for the hard-coded conventions that seem, on the surface, inherent to its very definition. […] Rather than lookin to an extant classical repertoire that crosses not just centureis, but millennia, “Mistico Mediterraneo’s” song cycle is of distinclty contemporary origins, though the polyphonic tradition at its core dates back to the 9th century. The music may sometimes feel of timeless antiquity, but hints of modernity abound.
John Kelman, All about jazz
Der Titel ist kein leeres Versprechen.
Jazz ‘N’ More
Paolo Fresu and Daniele di Bonaventura geben den Gesängen von A Filetta einen Rahmen, sie setzen aber auch Kontrapunkte, erweitern die Kompositionen mit Improvisationen. Jazz und Tango klingen an. Die beiden ordnen sich dem so kraftvollen korsischen Gesangsensemble nicht unter, sie fordern es heraus, umspielen es, erweitern es. Dass sich da aber verwandte Geister getroffen haben, ist in jeder Sekunde zu spüren. Ein Liederzyklus ist auf diese Weise entstanden, in dem sich Spirituelles und Irdisches, Kontemplation und Spannung, Trauriges und Freudiges mischen, der etwas von einem Gottesdienst in einer Kathedrale hat, aber auch hohe Kunst für den Konzertsaal ist.
Thomas Steiner, Badische Zeitung
This is an album with such taste, forward vision, and grace that I simply cannot recommend it highly enough. It was clearly a treat for those involved to make, and an incredibly satisfying set of music for the audience. Very highly recommended.
Greg Barbrick, Seattle PI
La musica ha un impatto emotivo molto forte, l’alchimia che si stabilisce tra le voci e gli strumenti è perfetta, e da vita ad un continuum straniante che lascia l’ascoltatore senza fiato per bellezza e sorpresa.
blog.libero.it
Sketches of Corsica, the Mediterannean and the wider world abound in this fascinating collaboration between lyrical Italian jazz improvisers Paolo Fresu and Daniele di Bonaventura and vocal ensemble A Filetta. “Mistico Mediteranneo” is the first documentation of an alliance that has been gathering momentum for a few years already; it is also the ECM debut of the Corsican singers.
The A Filetta group, is celebrated for its re-casting of Corsican vocal polyphony over the last three decades, and for helping to preserve a unique singing tradition, both secular and sacred, whose roots stretch back to antiquity. The A Filetta singers (“Filetta” translates as “fern” or “bracken”) never lose sight of the tradition, but have kept it alive by taking it to new places, writing compositions for the ensemble and initiating meetings with musicians of other genres. The group is led by Jean-Claude Acquaviva, who was just 13 when A Filetta was founded in 1978. For him, “Mistico Mediterraneo” is a faithful reflection of the trajectory of the group’s music: anchored in tradition but continually reaching out to other musics, “ethnic” and otherwise.
Paolo Fresu, from the neighbouring island of Sardinia, which has its own special vocal tradition, could relate at once to the Corsican music with its “refined and archaic voices”, its mix of contemporary compositions and its attempt to hold fast to “melodies vanishing in the darkness of time”. As the improvisers approach this regional music of universal appeal, Fresu’s pensive, romantic trumpet inevitably brings Milesian associations to mind, and the ingenious bandoneon of Daniele di Bonaventura implies ‘chamber music’ and ‘folk music’ in every breath of the bellows .
In October 2006, Fresu and Italian bandoneonist Daniele di Bonaventura, along with two other jazz improvisers (saxophonist André Jaume and percussionist Philippe Biondi ), were invited by stage director Francis Aïqui for a celebratory event in Ajaccio’s L’Aghja theatre, establishing a basis for further collaboration. Over the last four years the musicians have fine-tuned the song cycle now known as “Mistico Mediterraneo”, and di Bonaventura has gone on to work with the singers in other contexts.
Jean-Claude Acquaviva is La Filetta principal composer. His “Rex tremendae” and “Figliolu d’ella” derive from a requiem written in 2004, “Di Corsica riposu, requiem pour deux regards”, and first performed inside the Basilique de Saint-Denis outside Paris. “U Sipolcru” is a chant created for a Passion play enacted in Calvi at the beginning of the 1990s. “Liberata” is from a documentary dealing with the Corsican resistance movement during the Second World War. Film has been an important medium for the dissemination of A Filetta’s message, and they have worked extensively with Parisian film composer Bruno Coulais on soundtracks and incidental music of a dozen films and stage works. The chant “Le Lac”, based on a Tibetan mantra, was composed by Coulais for Eric Valli’s film “Himalaya, L’enfance d’un chef”(1999), while “Gloria” and “La folie du cardinal” are from Gabriel Aghion’s movie “Le Libertin” (2000). Three pieces here were written for A Filetta by Jean-Michel Giannelli, composer of contemporary polyphonic chant and occasional on-stage instrumentalist with the ensemble; two of his compositions set texts by Corsican poet Petru Santucci.
Paulo Fresu’s recent ECM collaboration with Ralph Towner, “Chiaroscuro” (released in 2009), successful both with the critics and the public, figured in the quarterly list of Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik. Since 1990, when he swept the Musica Jazz Polls, the trumpeter has been a multiple award winner. Fresu has appeared on more than 300 albums including leader dates for EMI, RCA and Blue Note. While “Chiraoscuro” was his first ECM release, he can also be heard on the ECM-distributed Watt label, performing with Carla Bley on the album “The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu” (recorded 2007).
Bandoneonist Daniele di Bonaventura (born in Fermo, Italy) was last heard on ECM on Miroslav Vitous’s “Universal Syncopations II” (also a major prize-winning disc – Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik, Jahrespreis 2007). Di Bonaventura has played across a broad field of music – from classical to jazz to tango; he contributes three compositions to “Mistico Mediterraneo”.
A Filetta, Fresu and di Bonaventura take the “Mistico Mediterraneo” music on tour in May and December 2011. Dates in the Spring include Stans, Switzerland (May 6), La Tour de Peilz, France (May 7), Lörrach, Germany (May 8), Le Mans, France (May 11), Bordeaux, France (May 12), Quimper, France (May 13), Vicenza, Italy (May 14). Further dates are currently being finalized. Details soon at www.ecmrecords.com.
