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引​き​篭​り​{​Otac​í​lio Melga​ç​o} [duration 12​:​18]

by Otacílio Melgaço

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引 き 篭 り

O t a c í l i o M e l g a ç o

[duration 12:18] 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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"´Short night
Close to me, near the pillow
A silver folding screen´ (Buson / Tr. by P.S.P.)

mijikayo ya makuramoto ni chikaki gin byoobu

みじか夜や枕にちかき銀屏風" (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

"In Japan, Hikikomori (ひきこもり or 引き籠り, literally ´pulling inward, being confined´, i.e., ´acute social withdrawal´) are reclusive adolescents or adults who withdraw from social life, often seeking extreme degrees of isolation and confinement. The term refers to both the phenomenon in general and the recluses themselves. Hikikomori have been described as loners or ´modern-day hermits´.

Otacílio Melgaço brings to the fore a delicate, extremely contemporary and throbbing theme. Sonically, we can do two readings as a prologue to countless other possible ones: 1 -
There´s the anguish, the abyssality of isolation very well represented (this is the normative version and the focus offered by specialists: the pathological background of the question), likewise 2 - The outline of human beings who prefer to turn to themselves, into themselves and not mere misanthropy (or low self-esteem or serious psychiatric - problematic - trends). I believe that O.M. opens a portal in this sense equally. Without doubt, not neglecting to consider the first topic mentioned (citizens who deserve to be treated and cured); I perceive the mosaic that´s his composition suggesting such heterodox connotation (even, perhaps, being a small representativeness among the Hikikomori): ´postmodern eremites´, highlighting the context surrounding the fusion between ´r-e-a-l-i-t-y´ and
´v-i-r-t-u-a-l-i-t-y´ and how much more and more they become inevitably indiscernible (note, so blazing in this EP ´引き篭り´, the relationship - made with mastery - of t-r-a-d-i-t-i-o-n-a-l and
f-u-t-u-r-i-s-t-i-c Japanese sonic elements), may be (seems paradoxical but it´s not ... precisely because of the networks provided by the technology) a growing ´confraternity´ (a ´brotherhood´ that does not involve physical but digital contacts) or, retaking the ´official´ prism, yet a future epidemic (which already worrying governments in some countries, such as, of course, Japan).

Here's another ´graduation´, the Herbs.

Herbs are usually men between the ages of 30 and 50 who do not marry and are not looking for sexual partners, have a very simple lifestyle, low-wage jobs and few demands. Although they interact socially, such men live a frugal and quiet life, usually in the interior. They have peculiar interests like gardening, photography and travel. Should they be blamed for this? I think: respected. What has been reported above that is beyond a personal right? Right? Hikikomori, at least some of them, may be people who prefer a solitary life, the self-knowledge rather than social coexistence. Loner: a person who opts not to associate with others. Recluse, introvert, lone wolf. Among others, two relevant sources can be suggested for the insulation, seclusion, solitude: cultural structures and ancestral desires. Therefore, it´s a phenomenon that deserves to be taken into account with more depth and open mind - when not insalubrious.

Considering this specific hypothesis, perhaps the biggest concern as to who follows this course by choice, is that it becomes, somehow, a part outside the uninterrupted financial machinery. Even an element that questions and bothers the insatiable lineament of the capitalist gear. Because, at the very least, such ´anchoret´ becomes a problematic piece in the mesh, or still, in one way or another, starts to be situated marginally, in a non functional/non-utilitarian manner. He may not be content with an existence that sounds, for him, like a tagged card game. Perchance he wants to stop leading to puppet life, who knows? Perhaps desires to cease to be one more number in a social clock-work to become Subject again (to himself and, apart from that, to others - thinking of, say, further evolution - regardless of whether through real or virtual ties/links, and I repeat: everything indicates that the future will no longer discern one from the other).

Reflecting on significant insurgency, embarrassment, nuisance as to the establishment, the status quo: (before the individual - in search of its identity - and the contraptions) who wins and who loses (in this case)? Who is who? Does ´winning´ and ´losing´ acquire new meanings? Which are? Here are the million dollar questions. In reality, they´re invaluable inquiries. I´m not ´preaching´ against collectivism (or associative perspectives; gregarious relations) but only elucubrating about its inhuman facet and what can and should be revised, modified, evolved ... through plural and expansive ways (although the alternatives that appear today may seem strange, more cellular - perhaps aimed at quality rather than quantity). This is the point that, in testimony, Otacílio Melgaço stressed as a possibility that deserves our special attention too. Those who do not suffer from an illness but can start to indicate us an alternative wind rose, why not? There will always be people who will marry, have children, maintain their materialistic and consumerist ambitions; the human race will not go extinct because of Hikikomori, but there are those who have the right (them, us, whoever wishes ...) to go in another direction, do you agree? Historically we have always come across artificers of this, just quote, from other idiosyncrasies, the emblematic example of Henry David Thoreau.

´Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god.´ (Aristotle)

Hikikomori, Herbs etc point us an intriguing ´existential north´ that has already emerged and is no longer insignificant statistically. The initiative to give them an ´aesthetic physiognomy´ is not only a proof of how much Mr. Melgaço remains attentive to the Era in which he lives/we live, however also represents a movement that brings us closer to this subject, certainly not allowing us to remain inert. That´s one of the attributes of Art, if I may say so. Advances in both collective and individual - immanent and transcendent - processes of unraveling, clarification, understanding, development ... in consonance with our time´n´space. Helping to decipher them, by contributing to their destinations. This is what the absorbing Melgacian Nipponese offspring ´引き篭り´ brilliantly does." (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

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I - The Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare defines hikikomori as people who refuse to leave their house and thus isolate themselves from society in their homes for a period exceeding six months. The psychiatrist Tamaki Saitō defines hikikomori as "a state that has become a problem by the late twenties, that involves cooping oneself up in one's own home and not participating in society for six months or longer, but that does not seem to have another psychological problem as its principal source".

More recently, researchers have suggested six specific criteria required to "diagnose" hikikomori:

- Spending most of the day and nearly every day confined to home,

- Marked and persistent avoidance of social situations,

- Symptoms interfering significantly with the person's normal routine,

- Occupational (or academic) functioning, or social activities or relationships,

- Perceiving the withdrawal as ego-syntonic,

- Duration at least six months, and

- No other mental disorder that accounts for the social withdrawal and avoidance.

While other critics point to cultural frameworks, Professor Flavio Rizzo of the University of Tokyo, as stated in review above, defines them as "post-modern hermits" whose solitude stems from ancestral desires for withdrawal.

While the degree of the phenomenon varies on an individual basis, in the most extreme cases, some people remain in isolation for years or even decades. Often hikikomori start out as school refusals, or futōkō (不登校) in Japanese - an older term is tōkōkyohi
(登校拒否) -;

II - In reference to the panorama if morbid:

While many people feel the pressures of the outside world, hikikomori react by complete social withdrawal. They usually have few or no friends. While hikikomori favor indoor activities, some venture outdoors occasionally. The withdrawal from society usually starts gradually. Affected people may appear unhappy, lose their friends, become insecure, shy, and talk less.

...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.

credits

released March 3, 2017

Hear more here:
soundcloud.com/otaciliomelgaco

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O t a c í l i o
M e l g a ç o {conception | composition | arrangement | synopsis | instrumentation | orchestration | engineering & sound design | art design [O.M., after Soutine] | production | direction}

Special Guests: Nausícaaa Ensemble | Otohiko Ootsuka

Estúdio Yoknapotawpha/BR + Unidade Euromobile

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Otacílio Melgaço Belo Horizonte, Brazil

Composer, Arranger, Conductor, Multi-
Instrumentalist
from
Minas Gerais,
Brazil.
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Official (English) Site
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"Music is like a bewitched Mistress." (Paul Klee)
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