Melodrum: The Man, The Earth, The Sky

Description

It is common knowledge that, for a quite a long time, the panorama of jazz production in Italy has been reaching levels of a very high quality. Without detracting anything from the value of many CD recordings (which are systematically produced by increasingly interesting figures in the Mediterranean Peninsula), one should however note that, in many cases, performances and interpretative skills are excellent, but the deep value of those productions remains vaguely ethereal; it appears to be confined within the boundaries of “properly performed” productions, which however remain poor in content. The itinerary of Melodrum, signed by Salvatore Spano, Salvatore Maltana and Francesco Brancato, began nearly ten years ago, in 2015. They had the demanding idea of succeeding in an enterprise attempted by many, i.e. to build a new and original path which could have creative affinities with both tradition and avantgarde. In their own words, they sought “a kind of global music, capable of entering a dialogue with the audience and fascinating it without falling into the traps of revivalism, of déjà vu, or of experimentation as an end in itself”. After two interesting works, such as Perspectives (2015), dedicated to some female figures in the world of opera, and Tony’s Dream (2018), inspired by the abstract re-elaboration of Antonio Vivaldi’s visionary musical world, the Trio’s creative intelligence and taste enters with a surprising naturalness within territories which are perhaps easy to imagine, but immensely difficult to conquer.
Let us write this immediately: what first strikes in this Trio’s contemporary reality is the fact that they play extremely well, but they also have in mind a precise feeling for balance, from the exquisitely musicological and philosophical viewpoint. In the wide ocean of the musical world, there exist many bombastic designs which hide the feebleness of either of these components. Nearly always, as already mentioned, it is precisely the project which reveals its frailty. As experience teaches, the best teacher is time. Time taught understanding to the three members of Melodrum; they were given the idea of elaborating that very concept of a compositional and performative balance which their research was analyzing. The Man, The Earth, The Sky is precisely the summary of that research. What pleases so much is that such an imposing subject as the one suggested by the title is explored within seven simple and straightforward pieces, rather than in a plausible, and perhaps logical, operation lasting a couple of hours, but which would have quickly exhausted its drive. The result is a CD demonstrating a seldom-found maturity, capable of purposefully presenting the intense and possible relationship between spirituality and music. In order not to get lost in such a field, the Trio wisely relies on mainstream jazz, and on what has been learnt and digested, later to stretch its wings and fly beyond the fence, into the territories mentioned a few lines earlier. When the actors of a music ensemble manage to do this, it means for them to have understood that balance might easily train one to seek for yet another balance through a simple change in perspective. This means grasping the possibility of varying, and of safely moving within seemingly different worlds. In other words, being capable of creating art. Bravura, as in Libre – the work’s second episode – also means proposing with nonchalance a journey within sound traditions capable of moving between Gregorian plainchant and liturgical chorales, with the surprising intervention of crystal-clear vocal presences such as those offered by the Choir “Voci Bianche Lasalliane” of Grugliasco (Turin). Without stopping in order to admire a meditation, the recorded tracks’ pace further displaces the balances, playing with the Western and contemporary energy of Elevation. It is capable of rewarding the Trio’s interplay, with Spano’s sparkling pianism, Maltana’s powerful bowing and Brancato’s constantly attentive and active drumming. The seven-odd minutes of the medley lending its title to the album are instead the climax gathering this recording’s meaning. Every protagonist’s subjective style and the feeling of a shared research find the mutually penetrating result of the various perspectives at play. There are three soloistic moments which serve to explain the ensemble in itself. Under some aspects, this is genius. To understand it better, just close to the cited piece, we find the flow (somewhat bluesy, somewhat prog) of Alma Hundida; in its closing, it gives us, with a touch of modernity and style, an excerpt from a touching politico-social appeal by Thomas Sankara (the former President of Burkina Faso), found in one of his institutional interventions.
More surprises are in store, though. Francesco Brancato’s evocative drum is the background to a short pearl from the tradition of the Northern-American natives, the Algonkin Blackfeet; this is told by the heart and by the light – while also deep – voice of Michela Atzeni, an actress, dubber and performer. This is all gathered in Shunka Manito, where Spano’s touch is capable of resuming a total expressivity, and of uniting, à la Abdullah Ibrahim, the Afro-American music’s basic sound gestures in themselves. Without special effects or fireworks, with the concluding Esperanto the Trio brings us toward light – perhaps the light of knowledge? – after the initial, shared-time Sequenza in Blue had opened the doors to the work’s essence. A careful handling of the recording’s sound, signed by Marti Jane Robertson (i.e. one of the most attentive and sensitive figures found in the recording studios of our latitudes) is also part of the story of this skillful musical research. Indeed, good cakes cannot lack the cherry on top.

Vittorio Albani, November 2022.