Rodrigo Amado The Bridge
For Amado this new band represents a deep dive into his own formative roots. With these three musicians by his side, Amado has the perfect context to explore the classic materials he considers to be the basis of his journey as a musician, an impulse that is part him and part history. As US critic Stuart Broomer wrote: “Amado is an emerging master of a great tradition, more apparent with each new recording or performance.”
This is a quartet whose name really represents, aside from a direct homage to Sonny Rollins, a bridge between different languages, backgrounds and generations, all united through improvisation.
"Tenor saxophonist Rodrigo Amado supplied another high point, with his allstar quartet (…) for an hour of incandescent free jazz, albeit leavened by passages of extemporized melody and meter. With the lexicon of 20th Century music literally at his finger tips, Schlippenbach was continually feeding material to the rest of the group, be that Monk-ish dissonance, astringent clusters or dancing lyricism. Hemingway especially was a monster: powerful and incisive, stoking Amado’s gruff false-fingered reiterations and multiphonic shrieks to new heights, just one manifestation of a tremendous chemistry. (John Sharpe, NYC jazz record, about Jazz fest Berlin 2022)
An exceptionally expressive performance that demonstrates more than convincingly that free jazz is still alive and kicking. (Jazzenzo)
Watch them at Bimhuis Amsterdam: https://www.youtube.com/live/3PsJryjZR-0?feature=share