Cyrille Aimée
Matrix Page
Curation & Recommendations...of and for musicians, writers, academics, painters, choreographers, filmmakers, theater directors, sound and set designers, chefs...
CURATION
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from this page:
by Matrix
Network Node
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Name:
Cyrille Aimée
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City/Place:
New Orleans, Louisiana
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Country:
United States
Life & Work
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Bio:
Cyrille Aimée's journey through music is a testament to the power of heritage and the boundless nature of creativity. Growing up in a multilingual household where music was omnipresent, she absorbed the Afro-Caribbean rhythms of bachata and merengue from her Dominican roots while residing in Samois-sur-Seine, home to the Django Reinhardt Festival. As a teenager, she found herself sneaking out to immerse herself in the vibrant jazz scene, sparking a lifelong passion for the genre and a belief in the universality of music.
Her nomadic lifestyle led her to live across four continents by the age of 20, from Santo Domingo to New York City, where she honed her skills both academically at SUNY Purchase and onstage in Manhattan's jazz clubs. With a reputation as a fearless improviser and a captivating performer, she garnered attention, winning accolades such as the First Prize at the Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition.
Signing with Mack Avenue Records, she released acclaimed albums and caught the attention of musical luminary Stephen Sondheim, leading to collaborations and critical acclaim. Embracing the digital age, she found success on platforms like YouTube, collaborating with fellow musicians and reaching millions worldwide.
Despite her New York triumphs, Cyrille felt drawn to new experiences, eventually settling in New Orleans in 2017. Immersed in the city's rich musical tapestry, she embraced her diverse heritage and explored new avenues of creativity. Energized by this environment, she ventured further, establishing roots in Costa Rica and embarking on a new musical venture.
Teaming up with producer Jake Sherman, Cyrille crafted her latest album, "à Fleur de Peau," a reflection of her personal journey and musical evolution. Blending jazz sophistication, pop immediacy, and Caribbean rhythms, the album showcases Cyrille's storytelling prowess and musical versatility, marking a new chapter in her artistic exploration. Released under the London-based label Whirlwind Recordings, it represents a culmination of Cyrille Aimée's diverse influences and unwavering commitment to musical authenticity.
Clips (more may be added)
This is a real matrix, a matrix in the original sense of the word: ˈmātriks / source / from "mater", Latin for "mother" ... inspired in El Aleph, Borges' tale in which the universe in its entirety is visible beneath a basement stairway in Buenos Aires, our Matrix conceived likewise to make perceptible the entire universe of mankind's creativity...
El Aleph P/E
Conceived under a Spiritus Mundi ranging from the quilombos and senzalas of Cachoeira and Santo Amaro to the wards of New Orleans to the South Side of Chicago to the sidewalks of Harlem to the slums of Kingston to the townships of South Africa to the villages of Ireland to the Roma camps of France and Belgium to the Vienna of Beethoven to the shtetls of Eastern Europe...*
Laroyê!
Thousands of crossroads (listed in the link immediately above) ... and millions of pathways, uncoiling from the sprawling cultural matrix of Terra Brasilis: Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian...
...constituting a small world network. Such networks exist everywhere around us, even inside us: our brains contain small world networks. Humanity is a small world network wherein over 8 billion human beings average 6 or fewer steps between any two given people, anywhere. Those steps are seldom all transitable though. In the Matrix they are. In a small world great things are possible.
*...in conversation with Raymundo Sodré, who summed up the beautiful irony in this sequence by opining for the ages: "Where there's misery, there's music!" Thus A Massa, anthem for the trod-upon folk of Brazil, which blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south until Sodré was silenced, threatened with death and forced into exile by the dictatorship...
And thus this Matrix, a small world network wherein all creators tend to accessible proximity to all other creators, irrespective of fame, location, or the censor.
Sparrow/Pardal Roberts
Recommend somebody and you will appear on that person's page. Somebody recommends you and they will appear on your page.
Both pulled by the inexorable mathematical gravity of the small world phenomenon to within range of everybody inside.
And by logical extension, to within range of all humanity outside as well.
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze: manager, Kamasi Washington
🔗connections from Kamasi include ↓
Susan Rogers
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers: Personal recording engineer for Prince, inc. "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"... Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory
🔗connections from Susan include ↓
Randy Brecker
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
🔗connections from Randy include ↓
Herbie Hancock
🔗connections from Herbie include ↓
Alfredo Rodrigues
🔗connections from Alfredo include ↓
Munir Hossn
🔗connections from Munir include ↓
Roberto Mendes
🔗connections from Roberto include ↓
Maria Bethânia
🔗connections from Maria include ↓
J. Velloso
🔗connections from J. include ↓
João do Boi ↓
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd-Webber: UK's premier cellist; brother of Andrew Lloyd Webber (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad: Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals: World's premier klezmer violinist
Matrix Ground Zero is the Recôncavo, bewitching and bewitched, contouring the resplendent Bay of All Saints (end of clip below, before credits), absolute center of terrestrial gravity for the disembarkation of enslaved human beings (and for the sublimity these people created), the bay presided over by Brazil's ineffable Black Rome: Salvador da Bahia (seat of the Integrated Global Creative Economy* and where Bule Bule is seated below, around the corner from where we built this matrix as an extension of our record shop).
Assis Valente's (of Santo Amaro, Bahia) "Brasil Pandeiro" filmed by Betão Aguiar
Betão Aguiar
("Black Rome" is an appellation per Caetano, via Mãe Aninha of Ilê Axé Opô Afonjá.)
*Darius Mans holds a Ph.D. in Economics from MIT, and lives between Washington D.C. and Salvador da Bahia.
Between 2000 and 2004 he served as the World Bank’s Country Director for Mozambique and Angola. In that capacity, Darius led a team which generated $150 million in annual lending to Mozambique, including support for public private partnerships in infrastructure which catalyzed over $1 billion in private investment.
Darius was an economist with the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, where he worked closely with the U.S. Treasury and the IMF to establish a framework to avoid debt repudiation and to restructure private commercial debt in Brazil and Chile.
He taught Economics at the University of Maryland and was a consultant to KPMG on infrastructure projects in Latin America.
Replete with Brazilian greatness, but we listened to Miles Davis and Jimmy Cliff in there too; visitors are David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR/WXPN
I'm Pardal here in Brazil (that's "Sparrow" in English). The deep roots of this project are in Manhattan, where Allen Klein (managed the Beatles and The Rolling Stones) called me about royalties for the estate of Sam Cooke... where Jerry Ragovoy (co-wrote Time is On My Side, sung by the Stones; Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin of course; and Pata Pata, sung by the great Miriam Makeba) called me looking for unpaid royalties... where I did contract and licensing for Carlinhos Brown's participation on Bahia Black with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock...
...where I rescued unpaid royalties for Aretha Franklin (from Atlantic Records), Barbra Streisand (from CBS Records), Led Zeppelin, Mongo Santamaria, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Jim Hall, Wah Wah Watson (Melvin Ragin), Ray Barretto, Philip Glass, Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd for his interest in Bob Marley compositions, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam and others...
...where I worked with Earl "Speedo" Carroll of the Cadillacs (who went from doo-wopping as a kid on Harlem streetcorners to top of the charts to working as a janitor at P.S. 87 in Manhattan without ever losing what it was that made him special in the first place), and with Jake and Zeke Carey of The Flamingos (I Only Have Eyes for You)... stuff like that.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.