2023-06-16 19:40:15
The Gramophone Allstars are starring this Saturday, from 10 p.m. in Plaça Catalunya de la Pera, a new edition of JazzPera, the event that was the embryo, this year a decade ago, of Ithaca Festival. Culture and Action. The big band of Jamaican music led by Bisbalenc Genius Ox will present this evening the vinyl edition of Love Letter (Bankrobber, 2021), an album with which the band removes “a thorn stuck for years” paying tribute to The Skatalitesthe legendary formation born in the mid-sixties in Jamaica and which pioneered the fusion of jazz with ska.
The work, which includes a version (Old Rocking Chair) and four own tracks inspired by the sound of The Skatalites (Marina Ginestà, Supersonic, One For Lola i Storm on Silicon), has its origins in an idea by Bou, who shortly before the outbreak of the pandemic, thought of the possibility of holding a concert exclusively interpreting the instrumental pieces from the group’s discography, including covers of The Skatalites already recorded on previous albums. However, once the lockdown was over, the band decided to make an album.
“We thought that we had already recorded some versions, and that a good way to pay tribute to a band of which we have always been fans, could be to do a work inspired by their music” explains Bou. “Normally, I write the music, but this time we spread out the composition part a little more, which is why it ended up being more of a choral work,” he adds about an album that also featured songs written by Pep Terrades, Pere Miró and Lluc Casares. “Each track is inspired by some specific aspect of The Skatalites’ music” points out the saxophonist, who acknowledges that the four musicians, as well as the rest of the band, have “grown up” listening to the music of the ska pioneers jazz
The recording of Love Letter it wasn’t exactly a road of roses, considering that this is a group of 17 musicians and that it was created in the midst of a pandemic. “It was complicated because there were so many people, we still had to record a lot depending on the masks and possible contagions. In fact, one of the band members, who was living in Madrid at the time, couldn’t come because they were dead there and there were perimeter restrictions. Luckily, finally, when it came time to record the songs, everything went well» recalls the musician.
Yolanda i Kathy Sey
As already happened in the presentation tour of the new work, The Gramophone Allstars will count again tonight at la Pera with the sisters Yolanda i Kathy Sey as vocalists. “They are the singers of the band. Before they may have played more of a role as chorus girls, but after the departure of the Judit Neddermann -who left the project at the end of 2019-, have taken on the role of vocalists. The singers have been on this whole tour and it’s great to have them,” confirms Bou.
Regarding the present of Jamaican music, Bou recalls that Catalonia “lived a golden age in the nineties”. “Yes, it is true that today this music is not in the foreground, although it must be said that it is not dead for nothing. We feel very comfortable and at the concerts people have a good time. In the end, it is music that continues to invite you to dance and that transcends all styles. It’s timeless.”
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