M o n s S a n c t i M i c h a e l i I n P e r i c u l o M a r i

- S h o r t P i e c e s F o r R h o d e s P i a n o -

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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"There are no conventional musical structures here. More important than melodies easily deciphered, nice normative harmonies, repetitive and predictable rhythms or nothing that I report but scholars paradigms we know so well (well reproduced oftentimes by numerous current epigones under the protection of the canonical wings of their patriarchs from ´classical´ music or jazz or etc., declared or covertly - explicit or surreptitiously - with reactionary air or alleged van), ... the most important thing here is that it opens up substantially a gateway to the becoming. We´re dealing with spectra of contemporary music at its nucleus. Are ontological structures but in decompression movements. I can say: they are sometimes misty poetic impressions, sometimes transpicuous aesthetic expressions; reigning - in its sonic architecture - a spirit of haiku. Irresistibly I am inclined to draw parallels with (citing two historically established personalities) the most sidereal works of Stockhausen and the most zen of Cage. However, more than reasonable analogies, there´s an extrapolation. This is a point that highlights Melgaço from most other current musicians. An extrapolation that targets a perceived identity, gradual authenticity that´s revealed by the flow of what is original in this artist, ie, that comes from its origins. Etymological question and stylistic. Mentioning the ´Mons Sancti Michaeli´, these ´Short Pieces for Rhodes Piano´ are a kind of ´sound shrine´ in honor of an impregnable (always blooming) originality. And so we face the danger of the sea (´in periculo mari´)! Under the aegis of this sanctuary (wherein dwelleth alluring oddity/idiosyncrasy): the flood already! After Melgaço, the flood..." (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

"´For it is related in our records how once upon a time your State stayed the course of a mighty host, which, starting from a distant point in the Atlantic ocean, was insolently advancing to attack the whole of Europe, and Asia to boot. For the ocean there was at that time navigable; for in front of the mouth which you Greeks call, as you say, 'the pillars of Heracles,' there lay an island which was larger than Libya and Asia together; and it was possible for the travelers of that time to cross from it to the other islands, and from the islands to the whole of the continent over against them which encompasses that veritable ocean. For all that we have here, lying within the mouth of which we speak, is evidently a haven having a narrow entrance; but that yonder is a real ocean, and the land surrounding it may most rightly be called, in the fullest and truest sense, a continent. Now in this island of Atlantis there existed a confederation of kings, of great and marvelous power, which held sway over all the island, and over many other islands also and parts of the continent.´ (Plato)

´Mons Sancti Michaeli in periculo mari´ is liquefied, is fluidized, almost a new mythological promise of Ἀτλαντίς (Atlantis) if it portrays the enchantments and incantations and surreality of Mont Saint-Michel. ´Mons Sancti Michaeli in periculo mari´ is ethereal, is limbic, hyperspatial. Predicates that represent the Melgacian composure to the musical instrument that has elected to such a work. I am aware of magnetism that the Rhodes piano has on O.M.
And rightfully so, from time to time we come across a ´reinvention´. The typical boldness of those who reach a considerable degree of preterhuman intimacy. Otacílio ´recreates´ instruments. In some Pieces, we'd never know that - there - exists a Rhodes piano after being exposed to alchemy of Brazilian creator. Including, alias, from an instrumentist to the core of an instrument, it´s the most profound ´declaration of love/devotion/surrender´: which transmutes and transcends." (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

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I - Mont Saint-Michel is an island commune in Normandy, France. It is located approximately one kilometre (0.6 miles) off the country's northwestern coast, at the mouth of the Couesnon River near Avranches. 100 hectares (247 acres) in size, the island has a population of 44 (2009).

The island has held strategic fortifications since ancient times, and since the eighth century AD has been the seat of the monastery from which it draws its name. The structural composition of the town exemplifies the feudal society that constructed it: On top, God, the abbey and monastery; below this, the great halls; then stores and housing; and at the bottom, outside the walls, fishermen's and farmers' housing.

Its unique position of being an island only 600 metres from land made it readily accessible on low tide to the many pilgrims to its abbey. Equally, this position made it readily defensible as an incoming tide stranded, or drowned, would-be assailants. By capitalising on this natural defence, the Mont remained unconquered during the Hundred Years' War with a small garrison successfully defending it against a full attack by the English in 1433. The reverse benefits of its natural defence were not lost on Louis XI, who turned the Mont into a prison. Thereafter the abbey began to be used more regularly as a jail during the Ancien Régime.

One of France's most recognisable landmarks, Mont Saint-Michel and its bay are part of the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites and more than 3 million people visit it each year;

II - The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano or simply Fender Rhodes or Rhodes) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became particularly popular throughout the 1970s. It generates sound using keys and hammers in the same manner as an acoustic piano, but the hammers strike thin metal rods of varied length, connected to tonebars, which are then amplified via an electromagnetic pickup.

The instrument evolved from Rhodes' attempt to manufacture pianos to teach recovering soldiers during World War II under a strict budget, and development continued throughout the 1940s and 1950s. Fender started marketing the Piano Bass, a cut-down version of the piano, but the full-size instrument did not appear until after the sale to CBS in 1965.

CBS oversaw mass production of the Rhodes piano in the 1970s, and it was used extensively through the decade, particularly in jazz, pop and soul music. It fell out of fashion for a while in the mid-1980s, principally due to the emergence of polyphonic and later digital synthesizers, especially the Yamaha DX7, and partly through inconsistent quality control in production due to cost-cutting measures. The company was eventually sold to Roland, who manufactured digital versions of the Rhodes without authorization or approval from its inventor.

In the 1990s, the instrument enjoyed a resurgence in popularity, resulting in Rhodes re-obtaining the rights to the piano in 1997. Although he died in 2000, the instrument has since been reissued, and his teaching methods are still receiving active use.

...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.