De Santis & Kouate
24.05.2022 – dalle ore 21:30
c/o Standards – Via Maffucci, 26 – Milano
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A quattro anni dalla prima presentazione di Prepared Drums, Standards torna ad ospitare il drumming aumentato di Daniele De Santis, questa volta esteso ed arricchito dal prezioso contributo del maestro percussionista e polistrumentista Dudù Kouate.
Effetto spontaneo di un esuberante primo incontro direttamente sul palco del Sajeta Festival 2021 e in seno all’Upperground Orchestra, che in quell’occasione ribilanciava una formazione occasionalmente ridotta con l’estemporanea partecipazione di Kouate, la nascente collaborazione tra i due musicisti non può che essere l’occasione di un dialogo dentro e attorno alle percussioni.
Trasformatosi in strumento condiviso, il sistema alternativo di amplificazione alla base di Prepared Drums diventa qui il metodo per un’elettrificazione sperimentale dell’orchestrazione tradizionale di Kouate, ma al contempo anche l’alchimia essenziale per l’incontro tra due vasti universi musicali, solo apparentemente agli antipodi.
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Daniele De Santis
Daniele De Santis is a multi-instrumentalist, percussionist and producer of Apulian origins, currently living between Athens and Berlin. As unfolded by the wide constellation of musical activities and contributions that have seen him involved so far, Daniele perpetually dedicates to the development of his peculiar instrumental language, which roots on Mediterranean and middle-eastern traditions just as in instant composition, abstract electronica and dub, while it also feeds on a constant practice in the creation of original instruments and experimental sound devices. Already prominent in the electronic atavism of his GRÜN Machines, which embody the specific attempt to conceive composition in terms of circuit design and gestural interactivity with the electrical automation, De Santis’ combination of instrumentalism and crafting finds a larger balance in the augmented drumming of Prepared Drums project. Exploring the boundaries between electro-acoustic and electronica, the project bases on the design and manufacturing of several nonaerial microphones models and their live implementation. Meant on purpose to achieve the difficult goal to over-amplify acoustic percussions without triggering feedback artifacts, Prepared Drums’ transducers are the means for a sound-system-magnified topography of the tactile timbres and resonant harmonics residing in the acoustic bodies; a rich as much as rare sound palette, finally serving De Santis’ aim of a post-acoustic and completely body controlled electronic music. Counting appearances in festivals such as Irtijal, Terraforma and SeaNaps, the project has seen in 2019 the release and international showcase (Drums Playing Drums) of Prepared Drums Vol. I LP, published in the form of a limited edition handmade dubplate by a joint venture of Dromoscope Editions and Das Andere Selbst. 2019 has also seen a further consolidation of De Santis’ work with producer-curator Rabih Beaini and his imprint Morphine Records, by joining the label’s roster as new member of the Upperground Orchestra. At the end of the same year he also appears on the drums alongside vocalist-performer Rully Shabara (Senyawa, ZOO) with a site specific performance at Milan’s Macao and hosted by Communion Records, which later in 2020 also releases A Thousand Steps, a special split EP seeing De Santis Shabara duo in dialogue with the audio-visual experimentation of AI artist-producer Lorem. Daniele has released music for Communion, Das Andere Selbst, Dromoscope Editions, 901 Editions and more, while having also appeared as musical curator and sound designer/engineer, especially within the realm of Dromoscope platform. Either in the form of a site-specific performance, or embedded in its related workshop series Homegrown, GRÜN project has been hosted by international entities such as Berlin Atonal, CTM Siberia, Strøm, PHONO, Macao, Sunnhordland folkehøgskule.
Daniele De Santis on Bandcamp
Dromoscope on Bandcamp
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Dudù Kouate
Member since 2017 of the historic Art Ensemble of Chicago, with whom he has extensively performed all over the world and took part to the recording of the formation’s 50th anniversary double album We Are On The Edge, Dudù Kouate sings and hits, blows, touches his 200 instruments, leading on a unique journey to the roots of the earth’s sound. Born in Dakar from a family of griots, the guardians of the word and musical tradition of West Africa, he left Senegal for Europe in 1988. Since then his prolific musicality brought him to perform in almost every corner of the planet: from the Atlantic Music Expo in Cape Verde to the Kennedy Center in Washington or Porto’s Casa da Música, passing through Australia, South America, Israel and southern and eastern Africa, with countless appearances within the wide circuit of the international Jazz Festivals. Among them: Assilah Festival, Utrechts Jazz Festival, Sant’Anna Arresi Jazz Festival, Roma Jazz Festival, Tampere Jazz Happening, Stockholm Jazz Festival, JAZZMADRID, Primavera Sound, JazzMi, Roccella Jazz Festival, Winter Sounds Festival, Jazz Jamboree international Jazz Festival, Festival Lugar de Encontrar, Santos Jazz Festival, Vilnius Jazz Festival, Chicago Jazz Festival, Jazzfest Berlin, Melbourne International Jazz Festival. Released in 2018 and followed by a good critics’ feedback, his first solo album Africation marks the rise of a new creative phase where Kuate’s traditional percussive orchestration is enriched by string and wind instruments, such as the Berber lute (xalam) and the Australian didgeridoo, while also singing in his mother tongue Wolof and in Mali’s Bambare. Counting collaborations with musicians such as Famoudou Don Moye, Roscoe Mitchell, Moor Mother, Abel Selaocoe, Hamid Drake, James Brandon Lewis, Mats Gustafsson and Silvia Bolognesi, Kouate is also involved in theater, cinema, dance and poetry. Currently based in Bergamo, he moreover carries on a stable didactic work which includes percussion teaching, conduction of seminars on the history of traditional African instruments and various workshops focusing on the construction of instruments with recycled materials. Dudù is also a qualified cultural and museum mediator, formed at the Ca ‘Foscari University of Venice as well as at Milan’s Ismu and Pinacoteca of Brera.
dudukouate.art
Dudù Kouate on Bandcamp
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