CURATION
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from this page:
by Title Holder
Network Node
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Name:
Robert Everest
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City/Place:
Minneapolis, Minnesota
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Country:
United States
Life & Work
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Bio:
Minneapolis-based singer/songwriter/guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Robert Everest has been joyfully exploring the music of the world for over 25 years. Performing an average of 150 shows a year--locally, nationally, and internationally--he has delighted audiences around the globe with his original compositions and his vast repertoire of acoustic world music. His fascination with foreign languages led him through a linguistics degree from the University of MN, which facilitated the development of the multiple languages he brings to his performances. He is particularly fascinated by the incredible variety of musical styles found within Brazil, and organizes and directs the most attended annual Brazilian event in the 5-state area, Carnaval Brasileiro of the Twin Cities. Latin American music makes up the majority of his repertoire, but he also plays music from Southern Europe, singing in Spanish, French, Italian (including different dialects), Portuguese, German, Greek, and of course English. He has been featured on NPR's Talking Volumes alongside Chilean author Isabel Allende at the Fitzgerald Theatre, All Things Considered, promoting his latest solo CD The World on Seven Strings, and The Jazz Image with the late radio legend Leigh Kamman. He has also been interviewed and performed on KBEM's String Theory with Kevin Barnes and KFAI's programs Global Beat and Corazón Latino. Television stations KARE11, WCCO, and KSTP have invited him into the studio for live on-air performances on several occasions.
Though mostly self-taught, Robert has studied jazz guitar in Minneapolis, Brazilian guitar in California, classical guitar in Portugal, West African guitar in Togo, Flamenco in Spain, Tango in Argentina, and many other Latin American styles of music throughout Central and South America and the Caribbean. He has also studied percussion in Ghana and Brazil. His vocal technique is the result of exposure to dozens of international approaches to voice and several years of instruction, including four years with the University of Minnesota Jazz Singers.
Robert has recorded two other solo CDs of music from Latin America, Gracias a la Vida and Aquarela Do Brasil, which have received national radio play and taken him to many international tour destinations. He also recorded and co-produced the album Sonho Meu with his Brazilian group, Beira Mar Brasil, which performed regularly in the Twin Cities from 1996 (then under the name "Mocotó Brasil") to 2005, during which time the group was invited to esteemed local venues like the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts, the Walker Art Center, and the First Avenue Main Stage, opening for Eddie Palmieri, along the way earning a nomination for Best Latin Band in Minnesota in 1998. The only chance you get to see Beira Mar Brasil these days is when Robert hosts the Brazilian Carnival Celebration each year, usually in February. This event, which features Brazilian guests that Robert flies in especially for this occasion, professional Samba dancers, authentic Brazilian masks, face painting, magic shows, and Brazilian food and drinks, is a must-see for any World Music aficionados.
With other ensembles or as a solo performer Robert has performed locally at venues like Orchestra Hall and the Fitzgerald Theatre, but most recently has performed a handful of shows in front of a packed house at the Dakota Jazz Club with his World Music ensemble "the Robert Everest Expedition." Among Robert’s international performance venues are the Ono Galerie in Bern, Switzerland, Bar Tempo in Madrid, Spain, The Golden View in Florence, Italy, and Birdland in Budapest, Hungary. His extensive Brazilian repertoire truly came full circle when he was invited to perform in the birthplace of Bossa Nova - Ipanema, Rio De Janeiro - at the prestigious Vinicius Piano Bar.
Robert has arranging and performing (both guitar and vocal) credits on Connie Evingson’s album The Secret of Christmas, and on Christine Rosholt’s Detour Ahead, both of which have received high acclaim. Other local musicians he has performed with include Lorie Line, Nachito Herrera, Tim Sparks, Estaire Godinez, Doug Little, Viviana Pintado, Becky Schlegel, and Pete Whitman, just to name a few.
Clips (more may be added)
We use the mathematics of the small world phenomenon to transform the creative universe into a creative village wherein all are connected by short pathways to all... (Wolfram explains how above)
This Integrated Global Creative Economy uncoils from a sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix...
Great culture is great power. From Brazil.
"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"
Our Matrix was conceived under a Spiritus Mundi ranging from the quilombos and senzalas of Cachoeira and Santo Amaro to Havana and the provinces of Cuba to the wards of New Orleans to the South Side of Chicago to the sidewalks of Harlem 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...*
Sodré
*...in conversation with Raymundo Sodré, who summed up the irony in this sequence by opining for the ages: "Where there's misery, there's music!" Hence A Massa, anthem for the trod-upon folk of Brazil, which blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south until...
And hence a platform whereupon all creators tend to accessible proximity to all other creators, irrespective of degree of fame, location, or the censor.
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 (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.)
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 opened the shop in Salvador, Bahia in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for magnificent Brazilian musicians.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar found us (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.
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.
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.comAcross the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
Wolfram MathWorld
Ex Terra Brasilis
Alicia Svigals
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Roberto Mendes
Luciano Calazans
Gustavo Caribé
J Velloso
Lázaro Ramos
Fernando Guerreiro
Maria Marighella
Russell Okung
Bule Bule
Caetano Veloso
RÁDIO MATRIX