BIOGRAFIA – it

Come qualificare la musica di Minino Garay ? world jazzy, jazz latin, groove argentino ? O « speaking tango » come a lui piace definire la sua musica? Sicuramente è un po’ di tutto questo favolosamente intrecciato.

20 anni di contaminazioni parigine e europee lasciano una traccia, aggiungendo à questo il meticciaggio delle origini di questo artista dove le radici africane si mescolano a quelle peruviane, dove la lingua spagnola si fonde a quella americana.

Influenze a parte Minino rimane Minino, l’oratore cosmopolita, il compositore, l’accentratore di talenti, il direttore d’orchestra particolarmente espressivo in un contatto permanente con il pubblico, con il quale instaura un rapporto al limite del possesso!

Ed è qui che i viaggi prendono inizio, dalla chitarra saturata al bandoneon, dalla tromba definitivamente jazz al bombo argentino, Minino abbina i suoni tra loro in perfetto capo convoglio. A minino piace coltivare l’ambiguità di una musica cosidetta « esotica » e ritmata, abbinandola a dei testi impegnati (alcuni scritti da sua madre) seguendo una sua filosofia : « sotto la spiaggia il bitume ! ».

Durante i concerti il groove è eccezionale, il gruppo si diverte, festeggia, suona con l’anima ! I musicisti, tre tamburi e percussioni davanti (Minino davanti con le bachette) e cinque musicisti dietro (piano, fiati, basso e chitarra) coltivano questa stessa unione del festeggiamento e della denuncia, ciò trascina il pubblico all’ascolto e al ballo contemporaneamente.

E a noi di chiederci ma il pubblico che sempre più numeroso segue Minino che cosa lo lega a lui se no Minino stesso ?

Spesso richiesto dai più grandi artisti del Jazz e della world music, Minino ha raccolto intorno a se personaggi come Lallo Zanelli, Pajaro Canzani, Pierre Bertrand o Eddy Tomassi, per formare il gruppo Los Tambores del Sur.
Il disco « Que lo pario », pubblicato in marzo dalla casa discografica francese Naïve, è la dimostrazione della profusione di universi che che influenzano Minino e i suoi accompagnatori, e in quel disco si sente che suonano suonano suonano e provano piacere a farlo tanto quanto ne danno a chi li ascolta.

Dopo una presentazione a Parigi a gennaio per l’uscita del disco Minino è in tournée continua in festivals e sale concerti di tutto il mondo dove ritroverà il suo pubblico, lo stesso che ha fatto di lui uno dei percussionisti più richiesti del Pianeta Musica.

BIOGRAPHIE – fr

Est-ce de la world jazzy, du jazz latin, du groove argentin ? Ou du « speaking tango » comme Minino aime parfois à le définir ? Certainement un peu de tout cela.

20 ans de mixité parisienne et européenne, ça laisse des traces. Ajouté à cela le métissage des origines argentines où l’africain côtoie le péruvien, où l’espagnol se marie avec l’américain.

Qu’importe les influences, pourvu qu’il reste Minino, le tchatcheur, le compositeur, le réunisseur de talents, le chef d’orchestre très démonstratif, en contact permanent avec le public, à la limite de la possessivité !

Et c’est à ce moment que le, les voyages commencent. De la guitare saturée au bandonéon, de la trompette définitivement jazz au bombo argentin, Minino combine les sons en parfait chef de convoi. Minino cultive l’ambiguïté d’une musique qui se veut « exotique » et festive, combinée à des textes engagés (dont certains écrits par sa mère). En quelque sorte « sous la plage, les pavés ».

Côté scène, ça groove, ça s’amuse, ça fête, ça chahute, en deux mots ça joue ! Trois tambours et percus devant (dont Minino au milieu à la baguette) et cinq musiciens derrière (piano, cuivres, basse, guitare) cultivent cette même ambiguïté du festif et de l’engagement. Ce qui conduit le public à une double attitude entre l’écoute et le mouvement des hanches.

Et le public de revenir de plus en plus nombreux se posant la même question de savoir ce qui l’attache à Minino ? Minino non ?

Souvent sollicité par des grands noms du jazz et des musiques du monde, Minino a trouvé le temps de rassembler autour de lui d’autres pointures tel Lallo Zanelli, Pajaro Canzani, Pierre Bertrand ou Eddy Tomassi, pour former les Tambours du Sud (Los Tambores del Sur). « Que lo pario », sorti en mars chez Naïve, est la parfaite illustration de la profusion d’univers qui habitent Minino et ses comparses, à savoir jouer, jouer, jouer et prendre du plaisir pour mieux en donner.

Après l’Alhambra en janvier dernier, une tournée des festivals en été et à l’automne 2009, Minino se produira sur plusieurs « petites » scènes parisiennes retrouvant le public qui a fait de lui, peu après son arrivée en France, l’un des percussionnistes les plus demandés de la planète musique.

BIOGRAPHY – en

A world groove from somewhere special

“Que lo pario!”, Minino’s latest album and his first since “Kilombo”, is again all about mixing musical styles. Despite his unclassifiable and eclectic, Minino Garay’s heart still appears to beat to the sounds of his legendary pampa twenty years after moving to France. The most vital percussionist and drummer of his generation still uses the nickname he was given as a boy (meaning “small”, strangely) and continues to draw on his origins in the Ayacucho neighbourhood of Cordoba, Argentina’s second city, some 800 kilometres from Buenos Aires. It is land that doesn’t know the sea with a population that is part Indian and no link to the tango, and from it blows a constant wind of rebellion.

This iconoclastic crosser of borders, born of the chacareras, milongas, zambas and other “folklore” (a term that does not have the same rigid connotations there as in Europe), assumes his hybrid status as a descendant of “Italians who speak Spanish and think they’re English” (it’s actually even worse than that because the people came by boat and usually only the captain was Spanish and everyone else was a “Moor”, an Arab. Holy smoke!)

Contrary to all historical assumptions, in reality it is the comings and goings, “ida y vuelta”, between Africa and Latin America that slumber beneath the skins of his favourite instruments. The “bombo leguero” – an instrument that is as negro as it is native Indian and used to be made by covering a large tree trunk with skins, to be hit with a stick – and the Afro-Peruvian cajon will make sure that our alchemist is in the right place at the right time. In the 1990s, Paris was the capital of world music with an explosion of many African cultures and Minino became literally obsessed with this city of many colours. Before he got his first taste of Mali playing with Dee Dee Bridgwater, and before he met Sheik Ti Diane Seck or fell for the gnawa festival in Essaouira, he had already played and performed with musicians who have all, in their own way, taken world jazz to a higher level, including Magic Malik, Julien Lourau’s groove gang, Richard Bona and Daniel Mille.

This is when an incredible family formed around the Tambours du Sud – the Uruguayan guitarist and star of Latin rock, Pajaro Canzani (who composed the sublime twilight song “Tenochtitlan” among others on this record), the pianist Lalo Zanelli (who wrote the beautiful “Un Mundo Diferente” here), the composer and arranger for the Paris Big Band, Pierre Bertrand, and the trumpet player Nicolas Genest. Not forgetting Minino’s South American percussionist friends Eddy Tomassi, Miguel Ballumbrosio, Sebastian Quezada and Hector Gomez…

Urban Afro-Latin jazz, which for a long time had been on the verge of breaking through but which suddenly took off in September 2008 at the Parisian Baiser Salé club is, on this album more than ever based on popular songs and old rhymes whose words we may have forgotten, but which re-emerge here alongside other more virulent, harsher lyrics. The polar opposite of “saudade” and the gentleness we attribute to it, this “speaking groove” is the rough version of a blues that the distance has inspired. Minino is like an animal ready to pounce, always hunting, and in this he resembles Argentina’s chaotic destiny – a violent history left gaping open like a wound that cannot heal, a land that was sold, and a sense of a country that was betrayed and is just beginning to face up to its past. Fiery Minino, “the terrible” as Jaime Torres the charango player calls him, also has something bucolic about him, something of the wounded bard continually in search of romance. As in the familiar chorus inspired by the popular expression Por ahi contaba Garay (any resemblance to our protagonist is obviously accidental), the “young cows” of the great poet Atahualpa Yupanqui, the smells of roast meat, and the world of nursery rhymes and childhood mysteries never seem to be far from his mind.

This music has its roots in and derives its meaning from two essential facts aspects of life in Cordoba – a very special sense of humour, and the virile, demonstrative language of the popular Cuartetos. In fact, Cordoba always comes across as being a “funny” place. The city has a talent for repartee, and humour is the regional sport; it is as if all these bizarre individuals had synapses programmed to make “chistes”, jokes. One version of this humour is expressed by the Cuartetos, a typical and incredibly popular form of music that attracts thousands of people to dance.

The original Cuarteto Leo, the Chebere in the 1990s or figures such as Carlito “la mona” Jimenez are still stars. These crazy bands of troublemakers, with their regular turnover of singers and leaders, their fingers loaded with rings, were initially accompanied by an accordeon, a double bass and percussion. Later on, they assimilated salsa and merengue arrangements as well as a remote cousin of the Columbian cumbia, giving rise to the typical local “cumbiero” style.

“Que lo pario!”, the album’s title track, which plays on the sad state of politics with lyrics by the contemporary Argentine writer Nury Taborda, is in the typical murga style (“meeting of bad musicians”). Reminiscent of the Bantu rhythms of Africa, this is cathartic, subversive music, an elusive art somewhere between dance, music and theatre. This murga – which is also related to the passion for football – is the other explosive and joyous face of a country that bears little resemblance to the melancholic image that tango has given it.

Emmanuelle HONORIN

Credits
Minino Garay y Los Tambores del Sur:
Lalo Zanelli: piano, vocals
Pajaro Canzani: guitar, vocals
Fabrizio Fenoglietto: bass, double bass
Pierre Bertrand: saxophones, arrangements
Nicolas Genest: trumpet
Line Kruse: violin
Eddy Tomassi: percussion, vocals
Miguel Ballumbrosio: percussion, vocals

Guests
Sebastian Quezada: percussion, vocals
Hector Gomez: percussion
Nicolas Arnicho: percussion
Charlotte Louledjian: percussion
Patrick Bebey: Hammond organ
Denis Leloup: trombone
Alex Pandev: vocals

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