A Different Drummer, Pt. 6: Iberian Beats – Jorge Rossy & Pedro Melo Alves

AAJ: What has been the most significant event in your career to date?

JR: Too many to cite! I'm at a loss to find just one...

PMA: This question made me smile. I'm happy to have had a lot of really fulfilling experiences in my short career, in great venues around the world and with top inspirational figures I'd never think. But I'll share an older one. Around when music was starting to turn central in my life I went to my first jazz festival to play as a student, back in 2007, called Festa do Jazz do São Luiz where all the jazz community in Portugal would gather yearly. Music felt like a really magical place to be. So I decided there I wanted to be a musician. And 2 or 3 years later I saw there live one of my all-time heroes, a pianist gone too early, called Bernardo Sassetti. In parallel there was another jazz festival, called Guimarães Jazz, where I'd go every year both as an external student and as part of my jazz bachelor where I saw many of my other all-time heroes like Herbie Hancock. So it all starts in 2016 when I got awarded with the Bernardo Sassetti Composition Award. This is when my career got its definitive boost and everything started happening. Later in 2017, I found myself on the same stage where I had seen Sassetti perform, to release my Omniae Ensemble album as a result of his award. And last year, 2020, I received a commission to bring an expanded orchestral version of this same Omniae Ensemble to Guimarães Jazz. So there I was again, standing on the shoulders of all the giants I had seen perform there before, almost not believing it was real. Full circles do happen.

AAJ: What is the best advice you've received about playing?

JR: I was lucky to have lots of advice! Some unforgettable short and ever-unfolding lessons from amazing masters: In 1983, Chet Baker told me: "Just make sure that every sound that comes out of your instrument is beautiful. The rest will work out by itself." In 2000, Chick Corea said: "You don't need to go through all the steps, you just keep listening and playing what you love. One day you will wake up and go to your instrument and everything you love will be there for you to enjoy." During the 16 days, I had the great privilege of touring with his quartet in 2012. Wayne Shorter gave me many great lessons that he delivered in very few words. Here are 3 of them: "Who are you? What do you bring to the table? Following is not enough." "There is nowhere to hide." "If you want to get to 10, shoot for 100 -you will fail but the audience will really appreciate that you tried." I studied piano with the great teacher Sophia Rosoff on and off for 10 years and she gave me many amazing lessons. One that's particularly helpful is: "A small adjustment goes a long way."

PMA: Hmm, so many things can be said. But the best advice I got about playing were the ones I got from the looks of the people playing with me when we're all deeply in the zone, transcending ourselves, happening. That look, and all the wordless wisdom it contains, is all I aim for when I'm on stage.

AAJ: Is there a bucket list project—related to drums/percussion or composition—that you plan to undertake in the future?

JR: Nope.... Except to keep getting deeper into the things that I'm already involved with. I'm curious to see where that takes me!

PMA: I'm currently very skeptical towards my biggest plans because of the world situation. So now I'm putting my energy on small-sized groups to, hopefully, perform a lot with them in 2022. But one of those bucket list projects I can think of is a major size production, in the lines of a contemporary music opera, where hopefully I'll be able to create a multisensorial immersive experience, connecting both music composition and improvisation to technology. Let's see what the future holds.

Selected Discography

Pedro Melo Alves
In Igma
(Clean Feed Records, 2020)

Just out of his twenties, Alves has already established himself as a genre-defying improviser, and he blurs lines here combining primal and ethereal elements. Beatriz Nunes, Mariana Dionísio, and Aubrey Johnson's vocal contributions emphasize the latter, soaring in high-pitched discord. Abdul Moimême and Melo Alves utilize a wide array of effects from customized electric guitars and percussion. Mark Dresser's deep, earthy tones and French pianist Eve Risser's reflective prepared piano sometimes act as anchors but are just as often a further expansion of the music.

The five tracks on In Igma flow together as a suite; intuitive, asymmetrical lines painted in extensive brushstrokes. It is a purge and celebration together in a richly detailed fantasy world. The altered voices are alien but expressive, with pleasing little minutiae like a spray of throat singing against the backdrop of Dresser's droning bowed bass, single notes from Moimême's custom-made guitars, and then a swirl of sound where nothing sounds earthly. Melo Alves' nuanced musicality is rendered in his precise use of cymbals and gongs. In Igma has an air of mystery which can be dense and piercing, its movements distorted in unfamiliar ways. But, in totality, it is a highly satisfying and wholly unique work of art.

Mehldau & Rossy Trio
When I Fall In Love
(Fresh Sound New Talent, 1994)

This album is interesting historically as the young Brad Mehldau, Jorge Rossy, and his bassist brother Mario Rossy struck out on their own. The three had been part of alto saxophonist Perico Sambeat quartet recording New York-Barcelona Crossing, Volume 1 (Fresh Sound New Talent, 1998), and its sequel. The Sambeat albums were recorded earlier but released later than the Mehldau & Rossy Trio project.

The trio mostly takes on standards here and though the recording is a bit rough around the edges, it is so only in comparison to the later efforts. Mehldau's composition "At a Loss" is occasionally over the top but it's balanced out by a brilliant take on the Charlie Parker/Dizzy Gillespie classic "Anthropology." Jorge Rossy commands the technically demanding shifts and complex rhythms. His visceral power and versatility are a match for Mehldau's.

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