L e T a j M a h a l N o i r

O t a c í l i o M e l g a ç o
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T h e M a h a s h i v a O r c h e s t r a

[duration 01:12:39] 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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"It´s the second work signed by Otacílio Melgaço and having The stunning Mahashiva Orchestra as a guest. It´s certainly not coincidence that O.M. explores what would be a darkling second Taj Mahal. The polysemic richness of the Brazilian composer and multi-instrumentalist is staggering! The way he designs again Indian accents in high universal language is ravishing!

´Taj Mahal rises above the banks of the river like a solitary tear suspended on the cheek of eternity´, said Rabindranath Tagore. But Aldous Huxley makes us perceive that ´marble covers a multitude of sins.´ White and black, two sides of the same coin. Yes, after ´OCA´

melgacootacilio.bandcamp.com/album/oca-otac-lio-melga-o-and-the-mahashiva-orchestra-otac-lio-melga-o-duration-1-16-11,

Melgaço pays us once more with the same currency. The same inestimable sonic gold." (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

"The Taj Mahal (from Persian and Arabic, ´Crown of Palaces´) is a white marble mausoleum located on the southern bank of Yamuna River in the Indian city of Agra. It was commissioned in 1632 by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan (reigned 1628–1658) to house the tomb of his favorite wife of three, Mumtaz Mahal. Construction was completed in 1653 and employed around 20,000 artisans under the guidance of a board of architects led by Ustad Ahmad Lahauri. The domed marble tomb is part of an integrated complex consisting of gardens and two red-sandstone buildings surrounded by a crenellated wall on three sides. Combines elements from Indian, Islamic, Persian and Turkish architectural styles and is widely recognized as ´the jewel of Muslim art in India´. It is one of the world’s most celebrated structures, a symbol of India’s rich history and regarded by many as the best example of Mughal architecture.

A legend says that it was envisaged to build an identical stately and magnificent tomb on the opposite bank of the river Yamuna, replacing the white marble for black. It would be designated as Mehtab Bagh (The Moonlight Garden).

I shall quote two ruminations: 1- The color black appears to result from time decay on the pallid marble originally abandoned in the place where the real was constructed. These stones would be used for the double and may have inspired such hypothesis; 2- In another conjecture: Mehtab Bagh is the image of the Taj Mahal reflected in the water. Between this and that I strongly believe that Mr. Melgaço absorbed the dual imagination to work it metaphorically - and exuberantly - in form of music. In other words, the transmuting power of the time (or the various facets of duration - videlicet an amount of time or a particular time interval -) and the reflexive element (reverberating and echoing) as new symmetrical geminate realities generator.

Once the writer Renu Saran declared that ´Taj has been described as having been designed by giants and finished by jewellers.´ I can literatim say the equipollent about ´Le Noir´." (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

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I - The Black Taj Mahal (Hindi: काला ताज महल, from Persian/Urdu: سیاہ تاج محل‎ "Black Taj", "Kaala Taj", also "the 2nd Taj") is a legendary black marble mausoleum that is said to have been planned to be built across the Yamuna River opposite the Taj Mahal in Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India. Mughal emperor Shah Jahan is widely believed to have desired a mausoleum for himself similar to that of the one he had built in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal. A European traveler by the name of Jean Baptiste Tavernier who visited Agra in 1665 first mentioned the idea of Black Taj in his fanciful writings. The writings of Tavernier mention that Shah Jahan began to build his own tomb on the other side of the river but could not complete it as he was deposed by his own son Aurangzeb. However, many modern archeologists believe this story to be myth;

II - "Ever since the construction of Taj Mahal, the building has been the source of an admiration transcending culture and geography, and so personal and emotional responses have consistently eclipsed scholastic appraisals of the monument." — Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, one of the first European visitors to the Taj Mahal.

The belief holds that Shah Jahan planned a mausoleum to be built in black marble across the Yamuna river, with the two structures connected by a bridge. The idea originates from fanciful writings of Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, a European traveller who visited Agra in 1665. It was suggested that Shah Jahan was overthrown by his son Aurangzeb before it could be built. Ruins of blackened marble across the river in Moonlight Garden, Mahtab Bagh, seemed to support this legend;

III - Many scholars believe the idea of the Black Taj belongs to fiction rather than history. The traces which are identified as the foundations of the 2nd Taj are actually the enclosing wall of a garden founded by Babur. The irregular position of Shah Jahan's cenotaph in comparison to Mumtaz Mahal's, is similar to that at the tomb of Itmad-ud-Daulah, and thus should not be of any striking significance. Besides, according to Islamic law, bodies are buried with their faces towards Mecca and legs towards the south, and the husband is placed on the right hand side of his wife. The interpretation that the cenotaph of Shah Jahan was not meant to be placed here appears to be superfluous;

IV - Modern excavations carried out in the 1990s found that they were discolored white stones that had turned black. As some believe that a more credible theory for the origins of the black mausoleum was demonstrated in 2006 by archaeologists who reconstructed part of the pool in the Moonlight Garden. A dark reflection of the white mausoleum could clearly be seen, befitting Shah Jahan's obsession with symmetry and the positioning of the pool itself.

...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.