José Antonio Escobar
This Brazilian cultural matrix positions José Antonio Escobar globally... Curation
CURATION
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from this page:
by Matrix
The Integrated Global Creative Economy
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Name:
José Antonio Escobar
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City/Place:
Barcelona
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Country:
Spain
Life & Work
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Bio:
José Antonio Escobar is one of the most distinguished and versatile classical guitar soloists of his generation. He is especially remarkable due to his perfect balance between his intense musical expression and his vast knowledge of the various musical styles and periods.
He was born in Santiago de Chile, where he graduated with Top Honors after studying at the Conservatory of Music-University of Chile. Immediately after graduating, he continued to perfect his studies at the Hochschule für Musik in Augsburg, Germany. Under the influence of his first master, the lutenist Ernesto Quezada, he became deeply interested in original ancient instruments from the guitar family. This motivated him to round out his studies by attending Early Music courses and master classes with renowned specialists such as Hopkinson Smith, Eduardo Egüez, and Juan Carlos Rivera.
While he is greatly interested in ancient music, he has always felt at home when interpreting 20th Century or contemporary music. This has led him to commission, premiere and record works by renowned composers as well as Chilean composers, in particular. He has also devoted some time to studying and interpreting music with popular and folk influences from Latin America. In this regard, he has worked in various projects both as a soloist and as part of Dúo Sudamericano, along with Javier Contreras, an outstanding Chilean composer and guitarist.
Throughout a period encompassing almost 10 years, he obtained more than fifteen prizes in the most prestigious International Guitar Competitions today, such as Francisco Tárrega (Spain), Alessandria (Italy), Alhambra (Spain), Guitar Foundation of America (USA), Julian Arcas (Spain), Karl Sheit (Austria), among many others.
As a soloist and chamber musician he has toured over 30 countries, covering almost all of Europe and the Americas, as well as some North African countries, the Near East, Asia and Oceania. He has also performed as a soloist with distinguished orchestras, namely Orquesta de Extremadura (Spain), Orchestra Filarmonica di Torino (Italy), St. Michel Strings (Finland), Hofer Symphoniker (Germany), and the Orquesta Sinfónica de Chile. He has also debuted in major concert halls such as the Brahms-Saal at the Vienna Musikverein, the Purcell Room at the Southbank Centre in London, the Herbst Theatre in San Francisco, Sala Cecilia Meireles in Rio de Janeiro, Teatro Monumental in Madrid, Teatro Teresa Carreño in Caracas, etc.
He has completed several recordings under the NAXOS and RTVE labels, receiving excellent reviews from specialized media. He has also worked on several independent recordings both as an artist and producer. He is currently living in Spain, and he is constantly invited to not only perform at recitals but also share his expertise by giving master classes and lectures at major music festivals, courses, seminars and workshops in prestigious universities around Europe and the Americas.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
1st Prize at the HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS International Competition in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1997.
1st Prize at the ALIRIO DÍAZ International Guitar Competition in Caracas, Venezuela, 1998.
1st Prize and Special Audience Prize at the prestigious FRANCISCO TÁRREGA International Guitar Competition in Benicàssim, Spain, 2000
1st Prize at the STOTSENBERG International Guitar Competition (currently Parkening International Guitar Competition) in Malibu, California, USA, 2001
1st Prize (2nd no awarded) at the JULIAN ARCAS International Guitar Competition in Almería, Spain, 2003
1st Prize at the NORBA CAESARINA International Guitar Competition, Cáceres, Spain, 2005.
2nd Prize – ALHAMBRA International Guitar Competition, Alcoy, Spain, 2002.
2nd Prize – FORUM GUITAR WIEN International Guitar Competition, Vienna, Austria, 2002.
2nd Prize – Concorso Internazionale di Chitarra Classica RUGGERO CHIESA, Camogli, Italy, 2004.
3th Prize – GFA International Guitar Competition, La Jolla, California, USA, 1997.
3th Prize – KARL SCHEIT International Guitar Competition, Vienna, Austria, 1998.
3th Prize – Concorso Internazionale de Chitarra Classica MICHELE PITTALUGA, Alessandria, Italy, 2003.
Clips (more may be added)
There are certain countries, the names of which fire the popular imagination. Brazil is one of them; an amalgam of primitive and sophisticated, jungle and elegance, luscious jazz harmonics — there’s no other place like it in the world. And while Rio de Janeiro, or its fame anyway, tends toward the sophisticated end of the spectrum, Bahia bends toward the atavistic…
Have you ever noticed how different places scattered across the face of the globe seem almost to exist in different universes... As if they were permeated throughout with something akin to 19th century luminiferous aether, unique, determined by that place’s history...
It’s like a trick of the mind’s light (I suppose), but standing on beach or escarpment in Salvador and looking out across the Baía de Todos os Santos to the great Recôncavo, and mindful of what happened there (the Bahian Recôncavo was final port-of-call for more enslaved human beings than any other place throughout the entirety of mankind’s existence on this planet), one must be led to the inevitable conclusion that one is in a place unique to history, and to the present.
Brazil absorbed over ten times the number of enslaved Africans taken to the United States of America, and is a repository of African deities (and their music) now largely forgotten in their lands of origin.
Brazil was a refuge (of sorts) for Sephardim fleeing an Inquisition which followed them across the Atlantic (that unofficial symbol of Brazil’s national music — the pandeiro — was almost certainly brought to Brazil by these people).
Across the parched savannas of the interior of Brazil’s culturally fecund nordeste/northeast (where wizard Hermeto Pascoal was born in Lagoa da Canoa — Lagoon of the Canoe — and raised in Olho d’Águia — Eye of the Eagle), much of Brazil’s aboriginal population was absorbed into a caboclo/quilombola culture punctuated by the Star of David.
Three cultures — from three continents — running for their lives, their confluence forming an unprecedented fourth. Pandeirista on the roof.
That's where this Matrix begins:
Wolfram MathWorld
The idea is simple, powerful, and egalitarian: To propagate for them, the Matrix must propagate for all. Most in the world are within six degrees of us. The concept of a "small world" network (see Wolfram above) applies here, placing artists from the Recôncavo and the sertão, from Salvador... from Brooklyn, Berlin and Mombassa... musicians, writers, filmmakers... clicks (recommendations) away from their peers all over the planet.
This Integrated Global Creative Economy (we invented the concept) uncoils from Brazil's sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix... expanding like the canopy of a rainforest tree rooted in Bahia, branches spreading to embrace the entire world...
Recent Visitors Map
Great culture is great power.
And in a small world great things are possible.
Alicia Svigals
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers (BOSTON): Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory ... Former personal recording engineer for Prince; "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd Webber (LONDON): Premier cellist in UK; brother of Andrew (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad (RIO DE JANEIRO/CHICAGO): Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze (LOS ANGELES): manager, Kamasi Washington
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
"Very nice! Thank you for this. Warmest regards and wishing much success for the project! Matt"
—Son of Jimmy Garrison (bass for John Coltrane, Bill Evans...); plays with Herbie Hancock and other greats...
I opened the shop in Salvador, Bahia in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for magnificent Brazilian musicians.
David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR found us (above), and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (he's a huge jazz fan), David Byrne, Oscar Castro-Neves... Spike Lee walked past the place while I was sitting on the stoop across the street drinking beer and listening to samba from the speaker in the window...
But we weren't exactly easy for the world-at-large to get to. So in order to extend the place's ethos I transformed the site associated with it into a network wherein Brazilian musicians I knew would recommend other Brazilian musicians, who would recommend others...
And as I anticipated, the chalky hand of God-as-mathematician intervened: In human society — per the small-world phenomenon — most of the billions of us on earth are within some 6 or fewer degrees of each other. Likewise, within a network of interlinked artists as I've described above, most of these artists will in the same manner be at most a handful of steps away from each other.
So then, all that's necessary to put the Brazilians within possible purview of the wide wide world is to include them among a wide wide range of artists around that world.
If, for example, Quincy Jones is inside the matrix, then anybody on his page — whether they be accessing from a campus in L.A., a pub in Dublin, a shebeen in Cape Town, a tent in Mongolia — will be close, transitable steps away from Raymundo Sodré, even if they know nothing of Brazil and are unaware that Sodré sings/dances upon this planet. Sodré, having been knocked from the perch of fame and ground into anonymity by Brazil's dictatorship, has now the alternative of access to the world-at-large via recourse to the vast potential of network theory.
...to the degree that other artists et al — writers, researchers, filmmakers, painters, choreographers...everywhere — do also. Artificial intelligence not required. Real intelligence, yes.
Years ago in NYC (I've lived here in Brazil for 32 years now) I "rescued" unpaid royalties (performance & mechanical) for artists/composers including Barbra Streisand, Aretha Franklin, Mongo Santamaria, Jim Hall, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd (for his rights in Bob Marley compositions; Clement was Bob's first producer), Led Zeppelin, Ray Barretto, Philip Glass and many others. Aretha called me out of the blue vis-à-vis money owed by Atlantic Records. Allen Klein (managed The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Ray Charles) called about money due the estate of Sam Cooke. Jerry Ragovoy (Time Is On My Side, Piece of My Heart) called just to see if he had any unpaid money floating around out there (the royalty world was a shark-filled jungle, to mangle metaphors, and I doubt it's changed).
But the pertinent client (and friend) in the present context is Earl "Speedo" Carroll, of The Cadillacs. Earl went from doo-wopping on Harlem streetcorners to chart-topping success to working as a custodian at PS 87 elementary school on the west side of Manhattan. Through all of this he never lost what made him great.
Greatness and fame are too often conflated. The former should be accessible independently of the latter.
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.
Salvador is our base. If you plan to visit Bahia, there are some things you should probably know and you should first visit:
www.salvadorbahiabrazil.com
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