Tom Bergeron
This Brazilian cultural matrix projects Tom Bergeron globally...
Curation
CURATION
-
from this page:
by Matrix
The Integrated Global Creative Economy
-
Name:
Tom Bergeron
-
City/Place:
Camp Sherman, Oregon
-
Country:
United States
Life & Work
-
Bio:
Tom Bergeron has performed throughout the United States, and in France, Poland, Germany, Costa Rica, and Brazil.
Since 2000 Tom has been deeply involved in studying, playing, and teaching Brazilian music – returning regularly to Brazil to further explore choro, samba, bossa nova, frevo, and Brazilian jazz. This passion led to the formation of the Tom Bergeron Brasil Band in 2012, which plays regularly throughout Oregon’s Willamette Valley and beyond. He also co-leads Vianna Bergeron Brazilian Jazz, based in Seattle, Washington.
Tom also draws musical inspiration from the jazz heritage and other music traditions from around the world. In the 1980s, he studied with the late Zimbabwean master-percussionist Dumisani Maraire, and was a founding member of the Eugene, Oregon-based African marimba group Shumba. He has premiered dozens of new “concert” works for the saxophone, and is the author of a comprehensive book on saxophone multiphonics, the esoteric technique of producing several notes at once on the saxophone.
During his varied career as a performer, Tom has performed with renown artists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Lynn Anderson, Hal Blaine, Anthony Braxton, Marvio Ciribelli, Rosemary Clooney, Natalie Cole, Robert Cray, Myron Florin, Vinnie Golia, Dick Hyman, Oliver Lake, Graham Lear, Joe Lovano, Glen Moore, Bernadette Peters, Luis Resto, Curtis Salgado, Bobby Shew, Sunny Turner, Gust Tsilis, Mason Williams, The Fifth Dimension, The Temptations, Guy Lombardo's Royal Canadians, and Marin Alsop's String Fever.
Tom began his musical journey as a multi-instrumentalist in Manchester, New Hampshire, studying piano and music theory with Roland Belisle, who learned stride piano from Fats Waller. His first professional experiences date to 1968, when he joined the New Hampshire Philharmonic as a bassoonist, and he formed his first band — The Tom Bergeron Dance Band — which played music of the Great American Songbook and The Beatles for wedding receptions and other events throughout New Hampshire. In 1974, he co-founded the jazz collective Antares — which for a bright moment in the mid 1970s was a fixture on the New England jazz club and steak house circuit.
Since that time, Bergeron has performed and/or recorded as a leader or sideman with many bands and ensembles, including The American Metropole Orchestra, Cathexis Orchestra, Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, Cascade Festival of Music, Eugene Symphony, Grande Ronde Symphony, Hagberg/Bergeron Quartet, Kansas City Symphony, Labirynt, Midnight Serenaders, Newport Symphony, Oregon Bach Festival, Oregon Coast Music Festival, Oregon Festival of American Music, Pittsburg New Music Ensemble, Portland Center Stage, Portland Chamber Orchestra, Sacramento Symphony, Third Angle New Music Ensemble, Western Rebellion, Whirled Jazz, and Whirled News.
Tom’s academic credentials begin with BA and BM degrees in music theory and saxophone under the tutelage of David Seiler, followed by a Master of Music degree in woodwinds with the legendary concert saxophonist and teacher Donald Sinta – who had served as a role model and mentor since Tom’s high school years. Upon moving to Oregon in 1981, Tom earned a doctorate in saxophone with another mentor and good friend, J. Robert Moore, who was among the last generation of students of Marcel Mule, the French Godfather of the classical saxophone. Tom has premiered dozens of new works for the saxophone and is the author of Saxophone Multiphonics: A Scalar Model.
For 28 years, Tom was Professor of Music at Western Oregon University, where he taught woodwinds, music theory, ethnomusicology, music business, songwriting, jazz, and Brazilian music — and served as both Department Head and Chair of the Creative Arts Division. He had previously taught at Eastern Oregon University, Lane Community College, the University of Oregon, Crescent Music Studios in Ann Arbor, and Groton School in Massachusetts.
He and his wife, Rosi, spend most of the year in the mountains of Camp Sherman, Oregon, and the rest of the year at their home in Niterói, Brazil, across the bay from Rio de Janeiro. When not working on music projects, Tom can often be found kayaking or hiking in the Oregon Cascades, or walking the beaches of Rio.
Contact Information
-
Email:
[email protected]
-
Telephone:
+1 503-917-9835
-
Address:
Tom Bergeron
Teal Creek Music
PO Box 716
Camp Sherman OR 97730
More
-
Quotes, Notes & Etc.
"Tom Bergeron stunned the audience...with some brilliant alto saxophone improvisation."
~ Sue Pilla, Eclipse Jazz Newsletter (Ann Arbor, MI)
"Tom Bergeron brought the house down with a stunning performance."
~ W. Thomas Marrocco, Register-Guard (Eugene, OR)
"Tom Bergeron's sax is so sweet your blood sugar soars."
"Outrageously good."
"Whatever Bergeron was paid...it wasn't enough."
~ Karen Kammerer, Register-Guard (Eugene, OR)
"Bergeron is a virtuosic saxophonist....He is a master of classical, improvisatory, avant garde, and jazz performance."
~ Jason DuMars, International Saxophone Home Page
"The climax of the evening [was] Bergeron's rapturous and brilliant work."
"Tom Bergeron stole the show with his frisky Eric Dolphy-like romps."
~ Mike Heffley, What's Happening (Eugene, OR)
"Bergeron, like Osby, produces clear, precise lines."
~ Mark Corroto, AllAboutJazz.com
"Bergeron's compositions move like a well-plotted story."
~ Lynn Darroch, The Oregonian
"Ferociously talented, pyrotechnically gifted."
~ Scott Williams, Sentinel and Enterprise (Fitchburg, MA)
"Bergeron's rounded tone is so smooth, his dynamic control so exquisite that the sound envelops you like a cool flannel sheet."
"Bergeron's music is an Oregon microbrew of rich flavors and rare quality."
"So good he's scary."
~ Brett Campbell, Eugene Weekly/What's Happening (Eugene, OR)
Clips (more may be added)
This is a small-world open-curation network initially created so that magnificent but unknown (to the wide-world) Bahian artists might be eminently discoverable by humanity everywhere. However! For the Matrix to function for the Bahians it must function for ALL artists/creators:
MATRIX ONLINE NETWORK
There are certain countries, the names of which fire the 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 universe. The Integrated Global Creative Economy (we invented the concept) uncoils from this sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix — concatenating branches of a virtual rainforest tree rooted in Bahia, canopy spreading to embrace the entire planet...
Ex Terra Brasilis
Starting point for this project was the culture born in Brazil's quilombos (in Angola a "quilombo" is a village; in Brazil it is a village either founded by Africans or Afro-Brazilians who had escaped slavery, or — as in the case of São Francisco do Paraguaçu below — occupied by such after abandonment by the ruling class):
...theme music for a Brazilian Matrix, from an Afro-Brazilian Mass by
From inside this Matrix, all creators-creative entities everywhere — empowered by the mathematics of network theory — become potentially discoverable by all people worldwide. Go straight to one of the (randomly selected) creators-creative entities below to see how their Matrix Page — information and media, outgoing and incoming curation — works (reload to feature other artists/creators), or find out below the black line below what unsung (metaphorically only) brilliance this is all about:
More on these profound incubators of Afro-Brazilian culture at:
Os Quilombos da Bahia
The Quilombos of Bahia
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 worldwide.
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.
Across the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
For a complete list of everybody inside, tap TOTAL below:
TOTAL
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Matt Garrison
RÁDIO MATRIX