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| June 6 – Felipe Salles' Camera Obscura combines jazz & chamber music in an inspired exploration of shifting perspectives, light & shadow Ages before we could view blockbuster movies on demand via pocket-scale smartphones or wall-covering high-definition televisions, the camera obscura provided humanity with its first, primitive method for transmitting images of reality onto a screen. A natural rather than a technological phenomenon, the camera obscura required nothing more than a pinprick hole allowing light into a "dark chamber" – the literal translation of its Latin name. On his mesmerizing new album, Camera Obscura, the imaginative saxophonist and composer Felipe Salles takes that concept as the guiding principle for an ambitious project that melds jazz and chamber music. This expansive sonic palette offers Salles a means of experimenting with the effects and interplay of light and darkness, shadow and color, imagery and divergent perspectives – the camera obscura, after all, doesn't replicate its source material exactly, but mirrored and flipped upside-down. "A camera obscura projects an image that is not exactly reality, " Salles explains, "but is made out of light and shadows and perspective. I wondered, 'How do I take that and make it into a song?' So all of the tunes on the album come from a variety of different perspectives and play with the contrast between light and darkness." Set for release on June 6, 2025 via Tapestry Records, Camera Obscura pairs Salles' working quartet – pianist Nando Michelin, bassist Keala Kaumeheiwa, and drummer Steve Langone (the latter a longtime collaborator recording with the band for the first time) – with The Cushman Quartet, featuring violinists Laura Arpiainen and Amanda Stenroos, violist Anton Boutkov and cellist Karl Knapp. The ensemble is joined by vocalist Tatiana Parra for "A Deriva (Adrift), " which Salles wrote to the words of his sister, poet and writer Helena Tabatchnik. In addition, Salles layers a full spectrum of woodwind instruments, all played by himself: soprano and tenor saxophones, piccolo, flute, alto and bass flute, clarinet and bass clarinet. The Cushman Quartet came together in 2020, co-founded by Salles' wife, violinist Laura Arpiainen, who had previously worked with the saxophonist on his albums Departure and South American Suite. That personal connection helped immeasurably in finding the right string quartet for the project, one that could deftly navigate Salles' challenging rhythmic and harmonic language and contend with the jazz quartet's brilliant improvising. "My quartet has been playing together for decades, " Salles says, "so I didn't want to just hire four string players;. I wanted a group that has its own chemistry. Laura is an amazing classical violinist, and she understands my music better than any other string player would, so when she formed her own quartet it made sense to invite them to work with us." The title track opens the album by aurally depicting the camera obscura itself. High, piercing violin represents the light entering the chamber, joined by slow, tenuous piano as it strikes the opposite surface – the makeshift screen. The ensemble fills in gradually, like a lush image slowly coming into focus. The idea of the camera obscura reminded Salles of Plato's allegory of the cave, which describes a group of prisoners who spend their entire lives watching shadows projected on a wall, with no notion of the flesh and blood figures, out of view behind them, who cast the two-dimensional shadows. Salles wrote "Platus" as an homage, drawing inspiration from the philosopher's name – Plato is not his given name but a nickname, most likely referring to his broad wrestler's shoulders and chest. "Perspective" approaches tango from a variety of stylistic directions, from pop to jazz to classical to the classic Astor Piazzolla feeling. "Trem de Prata, " which closes the album, features the sole instance in which the string players are asked to improvise, using extended techniques to conjure the image of a rusty, abandoned train coming back to life. The imagistic piece is based on a now-defunct luxury train from the composer's childhood, which he would ride from São Paulo to Rio de Janeiro. Memory is a key factor in the way that we perceive the past, and hints of it are laced throughout the very personal Camera Obscura. Four interludes meditate on the idea of memory: "Perception, " for woodwind sextet; "Remembrance, " dedicated to Salles' mentor, legendary saxophonist David Liebman; and "Memory" and "Lucidity, " both observations on the composer's mother and her cognitive struggles as she grows older. The saxophonist's name, Salles, translates as "Rooms" in French, so he used his own and his children's names to generate the melody for that piece. Finally, though he's worked with lyrics in the past, "À Deriva" is Salles' first foray into songwriting, so inspired was he by his sister's poem. "I've been wanting to do a project like this for decades, " Salles says of the genre-bridging album, which marks a bold departure in an already diverse career. He has led small groups and big bands, composing music that has integrated influences from Brazilian, Latin American and African traditions, arranged children's lullabies and the music of prison activist Tiyo Attallah Salah-El, and explored the challenges and richness of the immigrant experience. Throughout all of that, the dream of writing for his own hybrid jazz-chamber music ensemble has simmered on the back burner. "It took me thirty years to figure out my own way to approach it, " he says. "I feel like it was meant to happen now, when I finally have the maturity to write something the way I want to hear it and in my own voice." Felipe Salles A native of São Paulo, Brazil, Felipe Salles has been an active musician in the US since 1995, where he has worked and recorded with prominent jazz artists including Randy Brecker, Paquito D'Rivera, David Liebman, Melissa Aldana, Lionel Loueke, Jerry Bergonzi, Chico Pinheiro, Magos Herrera, Sofia Rei, Yosvany Terry, Jovino Santos Neto, Oscar Stagnaro, Luciana Souza, and Bob Moses. Salles is a 2018 Guggenheim Foundation Composition Fellow, a 2021 South Arts Jazz Road Creative Residency Grant Fellowship recipient, a 2015 and 2023 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant winner, a 2009-2010 winner of the French American Jazz Exchange Grant, and a 2005-2006 winner of the Chamber Music America New Works: Creation and Presentation Grant Program, grants sponsored by The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. He has released ten critically acclaimed recordings as a leader, the most recent being Home is Here (Tapestry, 2023), which continued Salles' musical explorations of immigration and its challenges with an array of guest artists who are also immigrants: legendary saxophonist/clarinetist Paquito D'Rivera (Cuba); vocalist Sofia Rei (Argentina); saxophonist Jacques Schwarz-Bart (Guadeloupe); flugelhornist Nadje Noordhuis (Australia); vocalist Magos Herrera (Mexico); saxophonist/percussionist Yosvany Terry (Cuba); guitarist Chico Pinheiro (Brazil); and saxophonist Melissa Aldana (Chile). Felipe Salles – Camera Obscura Tapestry Records – Capri 74173 – Recorded Sept. 8, Nov. 11, & Dec. 28 & 30, 2024 Release date June 6, 2025 write your comments about the article :: © 2025 Jazz News :: home page |