Tickets $20
Doors 7.30pm
Show 8.00pm
Born in São Paulo, Brazil, Eisenmann has always been intrigued by the idea of translating different musical sonorities to the piano. Eisenmann focuses on unique collaborations with artists from all different fields: dancers, poets, and actors. Among his latest releases, the 2017 album "The Free Poetics of Henrique Eisenmann" (Red Piano Records) has drawn unanimous praise from critics across the world. Eisenmann has performed in numerous international jazz festivals and has worked with dozens of outstanding musicians such as Gunther Schuller, Luciana Souza, George Garzone, Matti Caspi and Tom Zé.
Eisenmann is a professor of music at City University of New York (BMCC) and Jazz piano faculty at the New England Conservatory. His doctoral thesis explored the idea of free improvisation as an international phenomenon, using the music of Hermeto Pascoal as a model.
SHOW DESCRIPTION:
Spectacle “Voices” was envisioned by pianist Henrique Eisenmann in 2016 as a result of multiple experiences mixing music with the spoken voice. Drawing from several different musical styles – including classical music, contemporary jazz, avant-garde improvisation and folk Latin-American music – Eisenmann created a musical world that connects music to every “voice” in unexpected, provocative and lyrical ways. You will hear the voices of a 6-year old Peruvian boy in Lima; a Ghanaian girl on the streets of Accra; a group of washers from Brazil; Israeli poet Hadassa Tal and many others.
"What is left out of a word when all the meanings, images, grammar, rhymes, and symbols are gone?” To compose music based on voices and languages which I couldn't understand a single word sounded completely random and nonsensical. Yet from a different perspective, not understanding the symbolic meanings of the words allowed me to understand other dimensions of meaning, in this case, the sound. The melody of the words, the pitches, the inflections of every single syllable, and the harmony between the phrases suggested a whole new universe to be explored. Thus, a poem or a speech can be interpreted as a sonata, in which motives, tonal centres, dynamics and contrast create an organic pure art form. I worked over these recorded voices, transcribing the sounds and shapes of the phrases, finding the key of each speech - every voice has a tonal centre! These notes, phrases, and motives were developed and transformed into short pieces that I grouped into a suite, mixing improvisation, jazz, and contemporary music. George Balanchine once said: "Dancing is music made visible"; I would ultimately dare to say that "Music is poetry made invisible". (Henrique Eisenmann)