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In
the recorded interview that punctuates the second CD of Intervista,
Aldo Romano's latest album, the drummer gives this answer
to a question from Jazz Magazine Editor Philippe Carles on the
choice of tuned he recorded: "I don't make records to
play the drums, I make records firstly so I can express music; my
approach is not only that of a drummer, it's the approach of a
composer, at least I hope so". And elsewhere in the
conversation, the self-styled "downtown Paris and
Italian" drummer adds this about his motivation to write and
record: "... the deciding factor for me is meeting up
with a musician, otherwise the music remains vague. It's through
someone else that I can express the music I'm writing".
Aldo Romano has followed that path since the beginning of the
60s. Born into a family of Italian immigrants (in Belluno, on
January 16th, 1941), by the end of the 50s he was playing
electric guitar at the Bidule, a club in the Latin Quarter of
Paris. From time to time he also wielded his drumsticks,
replacing the regular drummer from Maxim Saury's "New
Orleans Revival" band, which used to play next door, at the
Caveau de la Huchette club. Not far from there, trumpeter Donald
Byrd was appearing with Bobby Jaspar on tenor, and drummer Arthur
Taylor. Aldo heard the sound through the air-shaft in the street,
and from that moment on he was electrified: "That was the
first time in my life that I heard modern jazz; the first time I
heard Art Taylor, and then Kenny Clarke after that, I said to
myself, I have to play the drums, I can't do anything but play
the drums. For me it was an extraordinary revelation, and then
later it was much more than that, more than a passion, it was a
commitment".
At the Chat Qui Pêche Club, and at the Caméléon, Romano
accompanied visiting American soloists: Jackie McLean, Bud
Powell, Lucky Thompson, J.J. Johnson, Slide Hampton, Woody Shaw
and Nathan Davis, to name but a few, all hired him during their
stay in Paris. Alongside them onstage, the budding drummer had a
daily lesson in the syntax and grammar of bebop. While this was
going on, he also made a few forays into the world of the up and
coming jazz explorers, the "free music" exponents such
as Don Cherry and Gato Barbieri, Frank Wright and Bobby Few,
Michel Portal, Barney Wilen, François Tusques, Jean-Louis
Chautemps, Steve Lacy, Roswell Rudd and Enrico Rava, etc... During the autumn of 1969 he was even,
for a time, associated with a young pianist whose merits were
beginning to be vaunted here and there: Keith Jarrett.
In the 70s, particularly during his tenure at the Riverbop Club
with the groups Total Issue and Pork Pie, among others, Aldo
experimented with the new genres that came out of the fashionable
fusion of jazz and rock. His main associates at the time were
François Jeanneau, Jean-François Jenny-Clark ("my alter
ego, my favorite bassist and an indispensable companion"),
Michel Graillier, Henri Texier, Charlie Mariano, Philip Catherine, Jasper Van't Hof. At the end of that decade, the
drummer made his first records under his own name, for the
independent label Owl. These were also recordings born out of
various encounters, "a dialogue in complete freedom",
first with Claude Barthélémy (Il Piacere, 1978), and
then Bob Malach, Didier Lockwood and Jasper Van't Hof (Night
Diary, 1980), Philip Catherine, Benoît Wideman and
Jean-Pierre Fouquey (Alma Latina, 1983). Not to mention
his 1980/82 association with a certain young Michel Petrucciani,
a pianist whom he'd discovered on tour in the South of France,
and who had so impressed him that he'd immediately introduced him
to Jean-Jacques Pussiau, the producer of Owl Records. Aldo was
subjugated by "Petru" and recorded two albums with him.
The rest, as they say, is history...
Later, in the mid-80s, after composing a few songs for Claude
Nougaro, and playing drums for a while behind Chet Baker or René
Urtreger, Aldo formed his own remarkable "Italian
Quartet", with Paolo Fresu, Franco D'Andrea and Furio Di Castri. With this group he recorded the sumptuous To
Be Ornette To Be and Water Dreams (for Owl) and, for
Verve, Non Dimenticar - in which some Italian popular
songs are revisited with tender nostalgia - and his previous
opus, Prosodie. More recently, for Label Bleu Records,
Aldo Took another of his current groups into the studio, the
amazingly refreshing band Palatino, with Glenn Ferris and Paolo
Fresu.
Intervista is a record by Aldo's latest ensemble, which is
currently blowing the evenings away at the Duc Des Lombards Club
in the heart of Paris. Apart from the extraordinary Swedish
bassist Palle Danielsson, the group includes two highly-talented
newcomers, the Italian saxophonist Stefano Di Battista (already
in evidence on the Prosodie album, and a regular members
of the ONJ led by Laurent Cugny), and also the young Brazilian
guitarist Nelson Veras. Two musicians with great class, both of
whom play with enormous heart. For them, Aldo composed and
arranged the thirteen magnificent tunes that make up this new
album, and make it as compact, full and dense as an egg.
It's an album in which one can travel from one climate to another
with the greatest of ease. There are Latin-American tunes
transcended by the delicate chords and pure sound of Nelson Veras
- "Saidas e bandeiras", "Pelourinho",
"Via de la Penna" - as well as an Italian classical
aria, freely revisited - Verdi's "Va Pensiero, sull'ali
Dorate", taken from Nabucco and themes with a clearly
jazzier connotation in the Coleman vein - "Gush!!",
"Patrimony", "Poet of the Hash" - in which Di
Battista, a lyrical and warm player, expresses his (strong)
talents. Ballads and blues à l'italienne, there's nothing
missing in this beautifully conceived album, produced and
performed by Aldo Romano, perhaps one of the finest he's ever
recorded. The interview with Philippe Carles that accompanies the
music, during which Aldo recalls memories of the different
periods in his career as a musician in the Paris clubs, is a
major contribution to the understanding of those who wish to
learn more of the artist, the joys and hopes of the most Italian
jazz musician in Paris. A must!
Biography courtesy of
Verve/Polygram.
For booking, contact:
AURA
Geneviève Peyrègne
62 bis, rue des Rondeaux
F - 75020 Paris
tel. +33 1 47970157
fax +33 1 47970956
e-mail: gpeyregne@thema.net
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