L i v e F r o m T h e R e d C a r p e t

O t a c í l i o M e l g a ç o

[duration 50:11] all rights reserved

#

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)

+

"The first Melgaço entirely live! Undoubtedly one of the most well articulated and remarkably insightful titles for a phonograph disc recorded live. The album cover is very suggestive and allows multiple connotations, from ´fierce criticism to showbiz´, passing by ´glamorous irony´ until ´the more alive scarlet Dionysism´. Deciphering the basic information provided by the artist for us, reviewers: we´re facing sonic flashes that occurred in various locations. Usually European. And at different times. Sound interventions engendered by Otacílio; an approximate decoding would be through the concept of modern Soirees or post modern or, more likely, timeless. Guests are elected (applicants are accepted) in a very selective way, signing a legal term: never reveal where is the niche in which the event occurred and what happened there. Musicians, writers, sculptors, poets, painters, choreographers, filmmakers, designers ... are some of the profiles to be embraced. Also scientists, architects, philosophers, anthropologists, philologists, semioticians, ethnographers etc. Private celebrations; multi-aesthetic transmidiatic Ceremonials; before an audience numerically not absurdly restricted not immeasurably fermented; in mid-sized areas; far from big cities just like small castles, for example. There´s the assumption that all use masks like a kind of extemporaneous Venetian Carnival. It would be a Kubrickian inspiration? In the case of Olympian ´Live From The Red Carpet´, better keep eyes wide shut and very open ears." (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

"All cosmopolitan tracks are original - despite some rousing self-incidentality. Planetary citizen, Otacílio Melgaço revealed that ´They´re compact compositions, mezzo pure pataphysics mezzo bright bizarreness mezzo acid asceticism mezzo exoskeletal exoticism...´. Witnessing the content peacefully incendiary or frantically lit from each of the six Pieces, there are no arguments to contradict him.

I have admiration for O.M. even at a higher level because he intertwines elements of various musical crops with wit and attractiveness. Melgaço does not remains reclusive and isolationist in an academic language - an actual academicism (and, being quite honest, this occurs for decades) often tediously ´hermetic´ (avoiding, sarcastically, another term: ´pressurized´) and, already routinely, stagnant. On the other hand, Otacílio does not gets lost in a proselytism that diffuses dubious mergers - as many currently.

He creates classical music and of great stature (in my opinion, among the most relevant and compelling worldwide); also moves towards a sharp Opening (prospecting diverse ethnicities, free jazz, eM, avant-folk, experimental rock etc) whenever he so desires. Moves through any area with ease, being always expansive and challenger. In addition, uses all the possible range of instruments - without becoming imprisoned by conventions. And more, between endless valuable aspects, is the extraordinary vocation, the particular gift he has to be arranger as well as sound designer-and-engineer. The treatment of recordings, ie, profound mutations, undergoing metamorphoses related to timbre, tempo, adjustment etc.; each subsequent interference amplifies the notion of creation to all stages of the daedal process. O.M. raises the composition perspective to one of the most indelible paroxysms that may we suppose! After all, he´s part of a rare Coterie of Originators that represents the best translation of what is and should be the Contemporaneity. More than that, when we hear all the Melgacian Work, we have enough evidence to note the following factor: there are artists that go beyond any temporal border (or stylistic detention) and so lie, idiosyncratically, above it. ´Live From The Red Carpet´ is a vivid proof of that." (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

&

I - "Bonzo" is a "Bhikkhu" (Pāli, Sanskrit: भिक्षु bhikṣu). "Bhikkhu" is an ordained Buddhist monk. The lives of bhikkhus are governed by a set of rules called the prātimokṣa or pātimokkha. Their lifestyle is shaped to support their spiritual practice: to live a simple and meditative life and attain nirvana. "Bonzo" is also a self-immolation, a ritualistic suicide practice, often used to refer to suicide by fire;

II - "Das Fliegenpapier" ("The Flypaper"). Based in a Robert Musil's short story;

III - Pierre Edouard Leopold Verger, alias Fatumbi or Fátúmbí (1902, in Paris, France – 1996, in Salvador, Brazil) was a photographer, self-taught ethnographer, and babalawo (Yoruba priest of Ifa) who devoted most of his life to the study of the African diaspora — the slave trade, the African-based religions of the new world, and the resulting cultural and economical flows from and to Africa. [It is in Africa that Pierre Verger is reborn, receiving in 1953 the name of Fatumbi, which means "one who was reborn for Ifá". His intimacy with the cult, initiated in Bahia, facilitates his contact with priests and local authorities. Verger ultimately becomes a Babalaô, diviner of Ifá prophecies, consequently accessing the heart of the Yoruba oral traditions.];

IV - "Omnia qui reticet, munera pacis habet", notable Latin phrase. Approximate translation: "Peace has everything that is Silent";

V - "Затерянные в Кремле", in Russian, means "Lost in the Kremlin";

VI - "The Rise and Fall of The Body Electric". "Body Electric" may refer to "I Sing the Body Electric", an 1855 poem from "Leaves of Grass" by the North American poet Walt Whitman. "The Body Electric" as well is a 1979 book on Kirlian photography by Thelma Moss; a 1985 on bioelectromagnetism by Robert O. Becker and Gary Selden and a 2002 on cybernetics by James Geary. ["At the heart of the sound Piece purposely caricatured electronic accentuation, perhaps a clue that part of the enigma which hangs over the title can be elucidated." (C.C.)]

...for purposes of pragmatism and clear exegesis,
Wikipedia was the main source...

\|/

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.