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"Transatlantic Tango"
Dino Saluzzi & Anja Lechner, duo
Sunday, April 22 • 2pm
$25 General Admission
“As close to perfection as any music-making I can recently recall” – Jazz Review
Program Notes
One of the foremost bandoneón players of any era, Dino Saluzzi has stretched the Argentine variant of the accordion well beyond its origins as a folk instrument. His recorded history with ECM (the label with which he has been affiliated since the early ’80s) is a progressive mixture of solo, trio, and jazz-leaning ensemble work. "The rise and fall of [Saluzzi's] bandoneon lines goes straight to the heart of life, demolishing any possible barriers between styles of music along the way," wrote The Birmingham Post [UK].
Saluzzi was raised in a musical family, with a father who played guitar, mandolin, and bandoneón, which he taught Dino from the age of seven. Family still plays an important role in Saluzzi's life and career. He records and tours regularly with a band that includes his guitarist son Jose Maria and his brothers Felix (saxophones) and Celso (vocals, bandoneón). That same strong feeling for tradition comes through in his respect for the traditional music of Argentina. "In the real artistic tango, which is kind of loose and permits free interpretation, it is not enough to know the technical part, the chords, the scales, etcetera, because it needs a totally different expression, less aggressive, far more artistic,” Saluzzi said. “The tango is something much more pure and complicated."
Saluzzi and innovator Astor Piazzolla rubbe elbows in Buenos Aires during the nascent days of the tango nuevo revolution. Where Piazzolla played exclusively his own music, Saluzzi was more interested in exploring the works of a diverse spectrum of composers. He was also wary of being hemmed in by the codified strictures of the music industry, which prompted Saluzzi to leave a regular radio orchestra gig and escape to the mountainous environs of Salta, in the northwest corner of Argentina, where he began mixing folk forms with avant-garde ideas.
Cellist Anja Lechner is a founding member of the Munich-based Rosamunde Quartet, which appeared with Saluzzi on the 1998 album Kultrum. She is adept at both chamber work and stretching into jazz improvisation and has proved her mettle in duos before, most notably with Greek pianist Vassilis Tsaboropolous. Saluzzi and Lechner’s new album, Ojos Negros, is testament to their unique, cross-cultural artistic kinship.
Personnel:
- Dino Saluzzi, bandoneon
- Anja Lechner, cello
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