F a n t ô m a s

O t a c í l i o M e l g a ç o

[duration 30:30] all rights reserved

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The artist Otacílio Melgaço has two official curators in the virtual world. A curator (from Latin: ´curare´, meaning ´to take care´) is a manager or overseer. Traditionally, keeper of a cultural heritage institution (e.g., gallery, museum, library or, as the present case: sound archive) is a content specialist charged with an institution's collections and, highlighting the context in force here, involved with the interpretation of personal (heritage) material. Both, Mr. Paz and Mr. Campbell, are, therefore, reviewers of the Melgacian works. To learn more about their missions, tasks, assignments and responsibilities by means of valuable informations regarding the compositional process, the performative rhizomes and other special features, just click the following link: otaciliomelgaco.wixsite.com/preamblebypsp
(O.M.Team; P r e l u d e)

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"This album is part of a cycle, in which O.M. makes combinatory re-readings of fragments of previous Melgacian works.

Here: a true jazzy saga.

Establishing a fabulous fictional rhetoric, from ´Igitur ou
la Folie d’Elbehnon´, by Mallarmé; Otacílio Melgaço, together with his highlighted jazzistic ensemble CadavreXquis, transports to the musical territoriality a magnetic personnage, Fantômas. It´s one of the most flawless combinations of improvisation and narrative flow.

´Stephane Mallarme's Igitur is a dream meditation carried on in silence and with quiet determination. It´s an initiation into the most solitary regions of the human soul.´ (Bettina Knapp; The Depersonalization Process and the Creative Encounter)

´Ce Conte s’adresse à l’Intelligence du lecteur qui met les choses en scène, elle-même.´ (Stéphane Mallarmé)

The perspective of relating both, each in its niche, artistic monuments (Fantômas and Igitur) is surprising. We can include, as I already mentioned: jazz. The result is a dynamic, mysterious, exciting, imagetic sound Piece.

The syntax adopted by Otacílio reveals instrumental sequences that are not secondary scenarios. They´re active counterpoints to the voice and its recitation. Voice that is dismembered in two, probably directing a searchlight to the (attractive) pathological mind of the character who gives the album its name. Sometimes we hear the speech closest to us, sometimes it seems more distant. There´s a connection with a peppy sense of spatiality that offers composition a veracity that does not allow us to remain passive. And when we´re led to believe that the content of the discourse has Fantômas as the source (perhaps as an interior monologue, or a soliloquy before one of his victims or ...), and when we hear a hermetic work like Igitur, supposedly for initiates (and here in a confessional tone): this junction is indeed enthralling because it suggests an incredible psychological and metaphysical density to the context. Touché!

The metamorphoses through which they pass piano, acoustic bass, drums besides side effects (and punctual strings of Zycluz Quartett) merge bold technique (according to an inventive prosody) and a pertinent portrait of several jazzy dialects.

´He is no longer the pretext for a story: the story itself renders him homage. The works of Fantômas can neither be destroyed nor accept modifications. ...Fantômas requires more of others than of himself ... He is never completely invisible. His likeness can be seen through his face. ... Fantômas's science is more precious than the word. It is not possible to guess it - and no one can doubt its power.´ (René Magritte)

´The story itself renders him homage´. True, there are no pretexts in regards to the Brazilian composer and multi-instrumentalist, but texts-and-textures (embodied by his art, as well as given to light by it).

´Fantômas's science is more precious than the word´. Not here. Here the words spoken through enigmatic Mallarmé's pen are as precious as. In identical way, Ladies and Gentlemen: the magnificent Melgacian music. ´Ah, if we were only on the steep side of some mountain with the moon like a great lamp above us, or by the shore of some wild ocean, there would be some glamour in proclaiming my identity in the silence of the night!´, wrote Marcel Allain. From now on, Fantômas has never been so glamorous ...

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´As she slowly came to, the princess, fascinated, gazed at the card, and this time her haggard eyes grew wide with astonishment. For upon the card, which until now had appeared immaculately white, letters were gradually becoming visible, and the princess read:

´Fan-tô-mas!´ (M.A.)

O.M. is always careful about the graphic arts of his records. He often doesn't want to reveal something but rather hide. He´s often picky with the look, not a bit patronizing/paternalistic. The images can reach a border and go beyond it but the eyes should offer a counterpart, as sophisticated as. Notice the intriguing tonality adopted. Perceive how, for example, through the treatment given to the original poster, the face of Fantomas becomes more frightening and obscure (and enchanting). Realize how his own body fuses with the surrounding scenario, almost (mimetic, chameleonic) dematerializing itself - a powerful polymorphic metaphor.

For these and other factors, we´re all witnesses of a (gradually becoming) very audible rematerialization (via the lips of O.M.):

´Fant-OM-as!´

Comedent igitur fructus viæ suæ..." (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

"Fantômas: A criminal genius, known by many nicknames, such as ´the master of everything and everyone´, the ´torturer´ or the ´elusive´, and whose face and true identity remain unknown. A ruthless criminal, he won't hesitate to torture and kill to achieve his goals.

Fantômas: a fictional character created by French writers Marcel Allain (1885–1969) and Pierre Souvestre (1874–1914). One of the most popular characters in the history of French crime fiction, Fantômas was created in 1911 and appeared in a total of 32 volumes written by the two collaborators, then a subsequent 11 volumes written by Allain alone after Souvestre's death. The character was also the basis of various film, television, and comic book adaptations. In the history of crime fiction, he represents a transition from Gothic novel villains of the 19th century to modern-day serial killers.

The Fantômas novels and the subsequent films were highly regarded by the French avant-garde of the day, particularly by the surrealists. Blaise Cendrars called the series ´the modern Aeneid´; Guillaume Apollinaire said that ´from the imaginative standpoint Fantômas is one of the richest works that exist.´ The painter René Magritte and the surrealist poet and novelist Robert Desnos both produced works alluding to Fantômas.

Now, Mr. Melgaço, in a dazzling and definitive character (´character´ in double meaning, because originally in my sentence I emphasize it as ´ethos´), is consecrated as integrant of this same ´pantheon´ by means of an electrifying surreal polysemousonic work." (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

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I - Fantômas was introduced a few years after Arsène Lupin, another well-known thief. But whereas Lupin draws the line at murder, Fantômas has no such qualms and is shown as a sociopath who enjoys killing in a sadistic fashion.

He is totally ruthless, gives no mercy, and is loyal to none, not even his own children. He is a master of disguise, always appearing under an assumed identity, often that of a person whom he has murdered. Fantômas makes use of bizarre and improbable techniques in his crimes, such as plague-infested rats, giant snakes, and rooms that fill with sand.

Fantômas's background remains vague;

II - Fantômas inspired Julio Cortázar's 1975 novella ´Fantomas contra los vampiros multinacionales´;

III - fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Igitur

...for purposes of pragmatism and clear exegesis,
quotes have Wikipedia as a source...

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Between two parentheses...
(Atonalism, Twelve-Tone, Serialism, Musique Concrète... Acousmatic. Eletroacoustic. Magnetic Tape. Expressionism, New Objectivity, Hyperrealism, Abstractionism, Neoclassicism, Neobarbarism, Futurism, Mythic Method. Electronic...Computer Music, Spectral, Polystylism, Neoromanticism, Minimalism and Post-Minimalism...are addressed by Melgaço. Paradoxically New Simplicity and New Complexity also.
Art Rock, Free Jazz, Ethnic Dialects, Street Sounds are occasional syntax elements.
All the possibilities mentioned above and others that were not mentioned are the usual accoutrements of the composer/instrumentalist to establish his ´babelic´ glossary. We can prove this in a short passage of a single composition up along the entirety of a conceptual phonograph album. All distributed over a career and idiosyncratic records. Have we a universe before us and I propose to see it through a telescope, not a microscope.
I propose not handle very specialized topics here. Otherwise would be, with the exception of musicians and scholars, all hostages of a hermetic jargon. Because more important is to present Otacílio Melgaço to the general public and not to a segment of specialists. Faction of experts not need presentations, depart for the enjoyment beforehand. For this reason there is no niche here for intellectual onanism and encrypted musical terminology. The reason for these parentheses is to establish such elucidation. The non-adoption of technicalities leads to more panoramic, amplifier reviews. Are You always welcome. Those who do not dominate contemporary music and are introduced to the world of ubiquitous O.M. [autodidact and independent artist who, being more specific, does not belong to schools or doctrines; artist who makes Music and that´s enough; music devoid of labels or stylistic, chronological, historical paradigms or trends] and Those who belong to the métier and turn to enjoy propositions they know and also delving into advanced Melgacian sound cosmogonies...
I conclude poetically. ´Certeza/Certainty´ by Octavio Paz. ´Si es real la luz blanca De esta lámpara, real La mano que escribe, ¿son reales
Los ojos que miran lo escrito? De una palabra a la otra Lo que digo se desvanece. Yo sé que estoy vivo Entre dos paréntesis.´ If it is real the white light from this lamp, real the writing hand, are they real, the eyes looking at what I write? From one word to the other what I say vanishes. I know that I am alive between two parentheses.
We´re all more and more a-l-i-v-e now.)
- P.S.P.