Tireless, curious, a great professional, but above all a 360 degree musician, that’s who he is Paolo Fresuthe second guest of Cremona Jazz 2024.
At the head of his Devil Quartet, completed by Bebo Ferra on guitar, Paolino Dalla Porta on double bass and Stefano Bagnoli on drums, he will play on Sunday evening, 12 May, at the Arvedi Auditorium in place of James Senese’s already announced group.
A very welcome return for the trumpeter to Cremona, very attached to our city and in particular to one of our musicians, Roberto Cipelliwith whom, over forty years ago, he founded his first group, the Paolo Fresu Quintet, perhaps the longest-lived of the active Italian jazz groups.
To explain the essence and importance of a musician like Fresu would take a long time, due to the multiple variety of things he has done and continues to do. As we said at the beginning, Fresu is a catalyst of experiences, he has relationships with musicians of all genres, and is open to the most disparate sounds; he pushes talents to emerge and since 1988 he continues to surprise everyone with his jewel “Time in Jazz”, the festival he created in his Berchidda, the place where he was born in 1961.
But the Devil Quartet is also celebrating twenty years, and in Cremona he will present the Impromptus project, always balanced between an acoustic dimension and electronic effects. Do you want an idea of what perhaps will happen on Sunday evening? Enjoy the video on You tube of the song “Black”(Impromptus Two).
But it is right to also underline some biographical notes of his companions in adventure, very briefly because each of them has a truly important musical and recording history. Starting with Bebo Ferra, Sardinian by birth, he was in fact born in Cagliari in 1962, but a true Milanese. In fact, it is here that he will meet and collaborate with the most important Italian musicians, from Franco D’Andrea with whom he will record his first album as a leader, to Gianni Coscia, from Paolo Fresu to Rita Marcotulli, from Pietro Tonolo to Gianni Cazzola. With Paolino Dalla Porta he recorded the Sundance album, while in 1997 he recorded music for the ballet Games as a soloist for the Orchestra della Scala. Until arriving at his latest work, from 2023 entitled Lights with Gianluca di Ienno and Nicola Angelucci.
Paolino Dalla Porta has been playing the double bass since 1978, is a composer and has collaborated with Italian and international musicians, from Dave Liebman to Don Cherry, from Sam Rivers to Mal Waldron, from Enrico Rava to Paolo Fresu. Discography that includes more than one hundred titles among his own productions and collaborations. In 1994 his album “Tales” was recognized among the best of the year by the prestigious Down Beat magazine and in 2009 he ranked first among Italian double bass players in the Top Jazz referendum.
And finally Stefano Bagnoli, known as “Brushman”, for his incredible ability to play the drums with brushes. He was the first in Italy to write a teaching method on the subject. He began his career early, and when he was not yet fifteen he joined the Sante Palumbo group in 1978. Then, over the years he will have the opportunity to play with true music legends, such as Johnny Griffin, Lee Konitz, Slide Hampton, and our own Franco Cerri, Renato Sellani, just to name a few. He has well over a hundred recordings, among which, curiously, we find a record by our own Fabio Turchetti, “Francis Drake” from 1990.
The concert will start as usual at 9pm, tickets available at the Violin Museum or on Viva Ticket.
A previous Fresu concert with Cipelli and Cifarelli
