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Jorge Pescara

Bass and touchguitar visionary

About Me

Discovered by Arnaldo DeSouteiro in 1998, when playing with his pop band Linha Amarela at Rock in Rio Café, Pescara was soon recommended to Ithamara Koorax and Dom Um Romão. Deeply impressed, Dom Um hired Pescara as the new bassist for his group in 1999, and since then he has toured extensively with him, besides recording on Dom Um’s two latest albums (Lake of Perseverance and Nu Jazz Meets Brazil, both for JSR). He also took part in an all-star benefit project (Street Angels) for the London-based Mr. Bongo label, playing on tracks led by Luiz Bonfá, Pingarilho and Ithamara Koorax. Pescara is also one of the featured artists on Friends From Brazil 2001 and Rio Strut, as a member of the Brazil All-Stars unit, alongside Deodato, Koorax, Dom Um, João Donato, Claudio Roditi etc. Since then, his performances have been praised by such critics like Ira Gitler, Patrick Dalmace (Jazz Hot), Douglas Payne, and Alex Henderson (All Music Guide). But nothing compares to his outstanding debut album as a leader, Grooves in the Temple, carefully recorded (during four years!) in Rio de Janeiro and NY, with state-of-the-art digital techniques. The repertoire was carefully chosen, mixing surprising treatments of very famous songs (Comin’ Home Baby, Led Zeppelin’s Kashmir, Jimi Hendrix’s Power of Soul) and haunting Pescara’s originals in tribute to bass heroes Jaco Pastorius, Marcus Miller and Tony Levin. ‘This all serves to whet one’s anticipation for Grooves in the Temple, as auspicious a debut, perhaps, as Jaco Pastorius’ 1975 solo debut’, states the renowned jazz historian Douglas Payne in the liner notes.

Pescara studied music in the FASCS, ULM, and EMM, and electric bass with renowned bassists Cláudio Bertrami and Arthur Maia. Pescara took a lot of invaluable acoustic bass lessons with Nicolaus Tchevtchenko. Writer and Musician, he often writes several articles to various kinds of music magazines like: Tok Pra Quem Toca, On and Off, Rock Brigade, Áudio Música & Tecnologia, Backstage, TKT News and Cover Guitar. Among the many books he has written, most of them currently in-print: Arthur Maia Transcriptions (editora MPO), six volumes of TKT Electric Bass Course (TKT Music Adviser), Dicionário de Contrabaixo Elétrico (H.Sheldon editora), Contrabaixo Completo para Iniciantes (Irmãos Vitale Editora), Manual do Groove (Irmãos Vitale editora), and Harmônicos (HMP editora). In ‘94 the bassist published the Video Workshop O Contrabaixo Completo by MPO Video. Since then, Pescara has appeared in many recording projects and live dates with such artists as Arthur Maia Project Band, Celso Fonseca (opening for Stanley Clarke at Rio’s Metropolitan concert hall), ZERØ, Dom Um Romão, DJ Marcelinho DaLua, Roberto Menescal, Eumir Deodato, Carlos Lyra, Sylvio César, Ithamara Koorax (with whom he toured in Europe and Asia), Lord K, Luiz Bonfá, Mario Castro-Neves, Thiago de Mello, Ney Matogrosso, Jadir de Castro, Márcio Montarroyos, José Roberto Bertrami (Azymuth) and Nabby Clifford.

Pescara also received international critical acclaim for his debut solo album, Grooves in The Temple, produced by Arnaldo DeSouteiros (João Gilberto, João Donato, Dom Um Romão, Ithamara Koorax, Luiz Bonfá) with an all-star line-up. Among the members of the dream-team are: Dom Um Romão, Eumir Deodato, Luiz Bonfá, João Palma, Glauton Simmas Campello, Ithamara Koorax, Cláudio Infante, Laudir de Oliveira, Cláudio Zoli, Paula Faour, DJ Dudu Dub, Guilherme Isnard, Sérgio Vid, and Alfredo Dias Gomes, plus Guto Goffi, Maurício Barros and José Carlos “Bigorna” Ramos from Brazil’s top rock band “Barão Vermelho”. Pescara is one of the most important touchstyle player in Brazil, also playing Chapman Stick on recordings with Ithamara Koorax (Love Dance/Milestone-Concord, and Brazilian Butterfly /JSR-IRMA), Dom Um Romão (Lake of Perseverance /JSR-IRMA), Eumir Deodato and Brazil All-Stars (Rio Strut-Milestone), Luiz Bonfá and Lord K (Street Angels/Mr Bongo) and ZERØ (ElectroAcústico/Sony Music).

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