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Sara Serpa sat down with trumpeter Dave Douglas, for Greenleaf’s Podcast, for a conversation about music. Click on the link to download/ listen.

 

“Dave sits down with Sara Serpa to listen to some her new album on Clean Feed as well as talk about her varied and diverse musical interests and practices. The Portuguese vocalist living in New York has performed with Greg Osby, Danilo Perez, John Zorn, Ran Blake and many others, in addition to leading her own groups as a composer and bandleader. The conversation also gets into her role in We Have Voice, an organization of 14 women dedicated to creating safe(r) workspaces in the performing arts.”

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Cantora – compositora de jazz e música improvisada Sara Serpa sediada em Nova Iorque, apresenta o seu novo trio numa mini tour nacional, acompanhada pela saxofonista alemã Ingrid Laubrock e contrabaixista argentino Demian Cabaud. O trio da cantora apresentará o seu novo disco, editado pela Clean Feed, Close Up, nas cidades do Porto, Lisboa, Setúbal e Madrid, com o apoio da Fundação GDA.

DATAS:

16 de Julho – Solilóquios, Porto, 21.30  Concerto a solo de Ingrid Laubrock

17 de Julho – Porta -Jazz, Porto, 21.30
18 de Julho – Casa da Cultura, Setúbal, 22h
19 e 20 de Julho – Hot Clube de Portugal, Lisboa – 22.30 / 24h
21 de Julho – Bogui Jazz, Madrid

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SARA SERPA

Recentemente incluída na consagrada votação de críticos (Critics Poll) da revista norte-americana de jazz Downbeat, como “Female Rising Star Vocalist”, pelo 4a ano consecutivo, Sara Serpa, natural de Lisboa, é uma cantora, compositor e improvisadora que através da sua práctica e performance explora uma abordagem única instrumental no seu estilo vocal. Reconhecida internacionalmente pelo seu canto sem palavras, desde que se estabeleceu em Nova York, em 2008, Serpa tem desenvolvido e apresentado o seu trabalho nos campos do jazz, música improvisada e experimental. Descrita pela revista JazzTimes como “uma virtuosa nas paisagens vocais sem palavras” e pelo New York

Times como “uma cantora de pose elegante e visão cosmopolita” Serpa começou a sua carreira gravando e actuando com expoentes da cena jazzística como o pianista nomeado para Grammy’s Awards Danilo Perez e o recipiente dos prémios Guggenheim e MacArthur Fellow Ran Blake.

A sua música requintada inspira-se em variadas formas de literatura, cinema, artes visuais, natureza, e história. Como líder, Sara Serpa produziu e editou oito álbums, o último sendo Close Up (2018), destacado pelo Público como “testemunho maior da sua afirmação na cena jazzística de hoje” . Serpa tem colaborado com um número extenso de músicos, entre eles André Matos, John Zorn, Mycale Vocal 4tet, Guillermo Klein, Andreia Pinto-Correia, Derek Bermel, Kris Davis, Aya Nishina, Nicole Mitchell. Para além deste trio, Serpa lidera um trio com Mark Turner e Zeena Parkins, numa performance interdisciplinar que combina imagem e música ao vivo intitulada Recognition, e o City Fragments Ensemble (3 vozes + 3 instrumentos) com Sofia Rei, Aubrey Johnson, André Matos, Erik Friedlander e Tyshawn Sorey. Sara Serpa faz parte do colectivo We Have Voice, que se destacou recentemente ao publicar uma Carta Aberta e um Código de Conduta a promover equidade de géneros, e a denunciar a discriminação de género e assédio sexual no mundo da música e artes performativas.

www.saraserpa.com

CLOSE UP – O NOVO DISCO

“Close Up abre novos caminhos (…) Mesmo cantando sem palavras, Serpa transmite a emoção da sua música inovadora e isso será suficiente para atrair fãs de vários géneros.”
Wall Street Journal

“Um álbum directo e delicado. A sempre fascinante vocalista Portuguesa Sara Serpa tem um dom raro de dar forma musical ao mundo da literatura”
WBGO

“ O testemunho maior da sua afirmação na cena jazzística de hoje”

Ipsilon, O Público

“Em termos de composição, Sara Serpa situa-se na vanguarda. (…) Close Up é uma afirmação sensacional da sua maturidade artística.”
Jazz Trail

“Um diálogo colectivo hipnótico”

Jazz Wise

“Retenha o nome de Sara Serpa e procure este disco na excelente editora lisboeta Clean Feed : é um disco incrivelmente mágico.”
Culture Jazz

“Sara Serpa, cuja voz brilhante e melodias sem palavras a distinguem como um músico líder no jazz experimental, eleva o nível cada vez mais alto com o Close Up (…)”
New York City Jazz Records

“Destemidamente individualista (…) É raro encontrar artistas que conseguem merger tão fluidamente música erudita, improvisação jazzística e música contemporânea”
New York Music Daily

“A cantora Sara Serpa é uma poderosa minimalista, que tem vindo a criar música cativante no contexto de duos e trios nos últimos 10 anos”.
All About Jazz

A convergência da voz, saxofone e violoncelo, apresenta uma combinação única que expõe cada instrumento com uma vulnerabilidade vanguardista. Tal como um plano de fotografia close up, saturado com detalhes, o novo e distinto trio de Sara Serpa apresenta uma abordagem contemporânea na escrita para a voz, desafiando papéis tradicionais e destacando texturas cruas no jazz e música improvisada. Nunca perdendo de vista o elemento comum que une estes músicos, Serpa conta com dois improvisadores extremamente inovadores, possuidores de um som preciso e uma personalidade músical particular. Colectivamente, eles criam e expõem um close-up detalhado do mundo musical de Sara Serpa, executando composições sem palavras ou com textos por Virginia Wolf, Luce Irigaray e Ruy Bello. Inspirado em experimentação, mudança de identidades, e um filme de Kiarostami, o conceito do trio é comparado a um plano de Close Up: estar exposto e sem possibilidade de voltar atrás.

Ingrid Laubrock – saxofones

www.saraserpa.com

Natural da Alemanha, Ingrid Laubrock vive em Brooklyn, New York desde 2009. Antes de se mudar para os Estados Unidos, Laubrock desenvolveu o seu trabalho como saxofonista e compositora em Londres, no Reino Unido. Laubrock já trabalhou como “side-woman” com músicos como with Anthony Braxton, Muhal Richards Abrams, Dave Douglas, Kenny Wheeler, Jason Moran, Tim Berne, William Parker, Tom Rainey, Mary Halvorson, Kris Davis, Tyshawn Sorey, Craig Taborn, Luc Ex, Django Bates’ Human Chain, The Continuum Ensemble entre muitos outros. Laubrock foi uma das solistas principais da ópera de Anthony Braxton, Trillium J. Prémios incluem o BBC Jazz Award for Innovation em 2004, Fellowship em Jazz Composition pela Arts Foundation em 2006, SWR German Radio Jazz Prize 2009 e o German Record Critics Quarterly Award 2014. Commissões incluem Jammy Dodgers para um quinteto de jazz e bailarinos (2006), Música para o Noneto do Cheltenham Jazz Festival 2007, SWR New Jazz Meeting 2011 e “Vogelfrei”, uma peça para orquestra de câmara (ACO/Tricentric Foundation).

Demian Cabaud – contrabaixo

Natural de Buenos Aires, Argentina, o contrabaixista Demian Cabaud é, desde a sua chegada a Portugal, em 2004, um dos músicos mais activos no jazz produzido em Portugal. Há vários anos ao serviço da prestigiosa Orquestra Jazz de Matosinhos, tem contribuindo para vários outros projectos nacionais, sendo Mário Laginha, Bernardo Sassetti, André Fernandes, André Matos, Gonçalo Marques, ou Maria João alguns dos nomes com quem colaborou. Paralelamente colaborou com reputados músicos de jazz internacionais tais como Lee Konitz, Joe Lovano, Mark Turner, Ohad Talmor, Perico Sanbeat, Maria Schneider, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Jason Moran, Maria Rita, Theo Bleckman, Sheila Jordan, John Riley, Jorge Rossy, Gerald Cleaver, John Hollenbeck, entre muitos outros. Editou cinco álbuns como leader: Naranja (2008), Ruínas (2010) e How about you? (2011), En Febrero (2013), Off the ground (2016). Graduado em 1998 pelo Instituto Tecnologico de Musica Contemporanea, Buenos Aires, e pela Berklee College of Music International Network in Argentina em 2010, Cabaud mudou-se para Boston (EUA) em 2001 onde com uma bolsa da Berklee College of Music, completou os seus estudos e contrabaixo e jazz em 2003.

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The Kitchen presents Vijay Iyer’s residency, The What of the World, for which he has assembled artists across musical disciplines to explore what he calls the “affective archaeology” of systemic racism. This multifaceted residency is an exploration, from many perspectives, of how racial oppression feels. Iyer’s residency features a series of evening performances, as well as Iyer’s new sound installation—titled How the Spotlight Sounds, with texts by Garnette Cadogan, author of “Walking While Black”—playing throughout the week.

 

PERFORMANCE DETAILS & SCHEDULE

 

MONDAY, JUNE 25

Sara Serpa: Recognition 
7pm, FREE
Portuguese vocalist Sara Serpa presents Recognition, a haunting exploration of her own family’s colonial history in Angola, in a trio with saxophonist Mark Turner and pianist David Virelles, performing with a silent film directed  by Serpa and produced by Bruno Soares.

 

 

TUESDAY, JUNE 26

Vijay Iyer/Garnette Cadogan: How the Spotlight Sounds 
12pm-6pm, FREE Installation

 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27

Vijay Iyer/Garnette Cadogan: How the Spotlight Sounds 
2pm-3:30pm and 6-7:30pm, FREE installation

Vijay Iyer & Wadada Leo Smith / Ganavya & Rajna
8pm, $25/$20 members
Iyer joins trumpeter-composer and creative music icon Wadada Leo Smith in a duo work, Deep Time: American Meditations, a series of musical tableaux memorializing the ongoing struggle for equality. Percussionist Rajna Swaminathan and vocalist Ganavya Doraiswamy present new work at the nexus of Indian musical traditions and creative music, reflecting “on whiteness and the various alchemies of power.”

 

THURSDAY, JUNE 28

Vijay Iyer/Garnette Cadogan: How the Spotlight Sounds 
12pm-2pm, FREE

Mike Ladd: Blood Black & Blue / Imani Uzuri: Wild Cotton
8pm, $25/$20 members
Poet/producer Mike Ladd joins Iyer, poet Ursula Rucker, producer/emcee Hprizm, vocalist Imani Uzuri, and musicians Marvin Sewell and Kassa Overall in Blood Black and Blue, “a contemporary story about encounters of police of color with victims of the same race,” based on dozens of interviews with African Americans in law enforcement. Vocalist-composer Imani Uzuripresents Wild Cotton, a meditation on “the undocumented soundscapes of enslaved Black-American ancestors that still haunt us today.”

 

FRIDAY, JUNE 29

Vijay Iyer/Garnette Cadogan: How the Spotlight Sounds 
11am-4pm, FREE

Himanshu Suri: Kebab Uncle / Arooj Aftab: Bird Under Water / Latasha N. Nevada Diggs: Trix are for Kids 
8pm, $25/$20 members
Queens indie rapper Himanshu Suri and Arooj Aftab collaborate with Iyer, Shahzad Ismaily, and Kassa Overall on Kebab Uncle, an incendiary memoir of being brown in post-9/11 New York. Pakistani American vocalist Aftab is joined by Iyer andIsmaily to perform excerpts from Bird Under Water, her latest album that undulates and scintillates with dark post-pop meets mystic muse. Poet and sound artist Latasha N. Nevada Diggs performs a solo set entitled Trix Are for Kids of “black and brown poetics that are never basic.”

 

This residency is presented as part of The Racial Imaginary Institute: On Whiteness. For more information about the exhibition and other programs please see our website.

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This coming Sunday, May 20th, 9pm, Brooklyn Conservatory  it is a rare opportunity of hearing my music with Angelica Sanchez (piano) and Erik Friedlander (cello). We will be playing music from my latest album, Close Up, and there isn’t any date of the trio in the city until the Fall… I look forward to make music with these two great musicians and would love to share it with you. Tickets here!!!

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As some of you might (or not) know, I have been working with a powerful group 14 musicians, performers, scholars, and thinkers from different generations, races, ethnicities, the We Have Voice Collective. Together, we are determined to engage in transformative ways of thinking and being in our creative professional world, and with that purpose we have launched a Code of Conduct for the Performing Arts.

Many institutions are adopting the Code of Conduct and we’ve had several featured articles on the press.

Check out the NYTimes here or WBGO/NPR here.

Many members of the WHV Collective will be present to  discuss our Code of Conduct in a roundtable at the Vision Festival.

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Below some of the most recent reviews and interviews about Close Up:
  • “Sara Serpa, whose shimmering straight tone vocals and wordless melody lines distinguish her as a leading  musician in experimental jazz, raises the bar ever higher with Close Up (…)” New York City Jazz Records
  • “Retenez bien le nom de Sara Serpa et repérez ce disque sur l’excellent label lisboète Clean Feed: c’est une réussite assez magique !” Culture Jazz
“…a hypnotic collective dialogue.” Jazzwise
  • ” “Listening” marks the midpoint of the album and another gradual-to-build skeletal confluence between voice, tenor and strummed cello. It’s also an explicit distillation through operative gerund of what makes the album work so well.” Dusted Magazine
And if you’re in the mood to read:
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CLOSE UP, is out today via Clean Feed!

Get it here!

It presents Serpa’s new trio with saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and cellist Erik Friedlander exploring an exposed and hyper detailed soundscape of original compositions

 

Through a series of critically acclaimed releases over the past ten years, Lisbon, Portugal native, singer and composer Sara Serpa has continually defied the limitations of genre, implementing a singular instrumental approach to her vocal style. Her new album, Close Up, presents the compelling configuration of voice, saxophone and cello, exploring Serpa’s own compositions. Accompanied by a stellar new trio, Serpa finds her partners in two innovative improvisers with distinct musical personalities: saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, one of the most significant voices in contemporary jazz and improvised music, and Downtown veteran cellist Erik Friedlander.

“The configuration of voice, saxophone and cello exposes each instrument with a precise vulnerability,” says Serpa. “From within this exposure, we look for cohesion and collective sound. I write the material, but the music takes shape in the process of our rehearsals and the time we spend together, through discussion and collective experimentation.”

The result is an album that resembles a high resolution photograph, a mesmerizing play on the idea of close-ups: the compositions, the musicians and their roles within the trio, and the recording process.

“The compositions also reveal close-ups of different episodes in my life,” Serpa explains. Take the example of the poignant song “Woman,” using the French philosopher Luce Irigaray’s text. “It exposes the invisibility of motherhood. Because that experience is recent to me, the text resonated with my thoughts and feelings,” Serpa offers. “Writing this song was part of a healing process, as I dealt with the realizations of the lack of support women artists receive as mothers, and of the paradoxical loneliness one can feel in one of life’s most beautiful events.”

All the compositions present striking atmospheres, glimmering with melodic and dissonant sounds, unified and transformed by the trio. Serpa, Laubrock and Friedlander play with their roles, alternating in creating backgrounds, to holding down bass lines, or to playing extremely long tones that become textures. “To find our place without a harmonic instrument was an interesting challenge and I enjoyed learning how to be independent, to be featured as soloist, or to act in ensemble, whatever each song was calling for.” Laubrock and Friedlander are valuable partners in these roles; shifting with their unpredictable phrasing, extreme versatility, and attentive ears.

Iranian film director Kiarostami’s film Close Up is cited as an influence in the album’s liner notes. “The movie (a masterpiece itself) plays with the idea of actors who are in fact not actors but become actors of a fictitious film, providing a common thread between the film and the music I was creating at the same time I was watching it.”

The quality of being still, of observing as nature unfolds, comes across in the song “Storm Coming,” highlighted by Ingrid Laubrock’s masterful solo improvisation. In the dark and ambient section, each instrument blends into the other, rendering the piece an impressionistic sonic experience, an image of dark clouds slowly gathering before a storm.

Serpa, whose natural instinct is to sing wordlessly -“When I lack words, I sing sounds, and emotions are conveyed through those sounds” – uses literature as inspiration in several of this album’s pieces: Luce Irigaray for “Woman,” and Virginia Woolf in “The Future.” Portuguese poet Ruy Bello’s “Pássaros,” Birds, is the backbone for an eccentric and energetic piece. “The poem is about how birds are tree’s fruits, and how birds make the trees sing. Imagining the trees singing is an inspiring image,” the singer explains.

“Object,” “Quiet Riot,” and “Sol Enganador,” exploratory and complex in their compositional nature, are all instrumental pieces, in which the voice functions as an equal to the cello and the saxophone.

Close Up reveals Serpa’s voice as never before – her sound is full, consistent, and expressive. “Cantar Ao Fim,” at the end of the album’s journey, starts with a vocal improvisation that makes one wonder whether Serpa is singing right next to your ear, intimate and quotidian. “This song came out of an improvisation I recorded on my phone when I was out in the mountains, at night. That moment stayed with me, looking at the mountains and singing without thinking or judging what was coming out. There is something very powerful in singing alone in the nature.”

 

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Sara Serpa’s new album CLOSE UP will be out on Friday, March 16th, on Clean Feed Records.

Some reviews are already out!

“Voice as a textural element has been a growing trend in jazz for several years. Important composers and bandleaders like Steve Coleman, Ryan Keberle, Maria Schneider and Jen Shyu employ vocals in unique ways, but usually in large or midsize ensembles. Ms. Serpa’s triumph is to bring this ambitious approach to an intimate setting. Even without words she conveys the emotion of her innovative music, and that should broaden its appeal to fans of many different genres.“ Wall Street Journal, by Martin Johnson

” No se trata de un disco que busque el entretenimiento (aunque el buen arte siempre llene nuestras horas con utilidad); es una puerta que se abre para encontrar al otro lado, sencilla y terriblemente, a nosotros mismos. Toda esta bendita y maldita pureza la intentaremos asumir a lo largo de un sendero pleno en riqueza, conmovedor en matices, avanzando al ritmo que sus nueve temas marcan desde una distribución musical y vital aritmética. El orden elegido es necesario; es real.”  Missingduke, Miriam Arbalejo

“Composition-wise, Serpa is ahead of the curve, establishing her ideas with one foot on the avant-garde and the other on the new music. Categorization can be a difficult task, but what’s really relevant here is that Close Up guarantees an arresting affirmation of her artistic maturity.“ Jazz Trail, Filipe Freitas