music
Rodrigo Amado is an undisputed force in the world of modern jazz. Distinguished as one of the great names in European improvisation music, the Portuguese saxophonist is often included in lists of the best jazz musicians in the world: in 2023, he was elected by the prestigious El Intruso International Critics Poll as the best tenor saxophonist, in a list that included musicians such as James Brandon Lewis, Charles Lloyd and Ingrid Laubrock. With an immaculate technique and a fascinating expressiveness of sound, Amado is a master of the saxophone who embraces all the freedom that free jazz and improvised music allows him. “If we’re working from nothing, we can be 100 per cent focused on the moment,” the musician told Bandcamp Daily in 2018.
Whether solo, in a trio or quartet, Rodrigo Amado excels in all contexts and formations. Active for almost two decades, he heads Motion Trio, with Miguel Mira and Gabriel Ferrandini, is part of Humanisation 4tet, with Luís Lopes, Aaron Gonzalez and Stefan Gonzalez, and leads the much celebrated This Is Our Language Quartet, with Americans Joe McPhee, Kent Kessler and Chris Corsano.
For this concert, Rodrigo Amado introduces us to a new line-up that presents itself as “The Bridge”, the title of the iconic album by Sonny Rollins, a living saxophone legend, to whom he pays homage with the name of the quartet. “The Bridge” is a bridge between different languages, origins and generations, all united through improvisation, where Amado brings together three of the greatest figures in European improvised music: German pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach, who has a career spanning almost sixty years and countless key formations in the history of European free jazz; Norwegian bassist and composer Ingebrigt Håker Flaten, an improviser who has been at the forefront of creative music since the 1990s; and legendary American drummer Gerry Hemingway, who since the late 1970s has accompanied Evan Parker, Cecil Smith, Derek Bailey, Anthony Davis, Wadada Leo Smith, among many others. A true luxury quartet that, in October 2023, presented us with Beyond the Margins (Trost Records), an album that serves as a calling card for what we’ll see at this unmissable concert.
rodrigo amado saxophone
alexander von schlippenbach piano
ingebrigt håker flaten doublebass
gerry hemingway drums
support portuguese republic – culture / directorate-general for the arts. rtcp – network of portuguese theatres and cinemas
