TIZIANO TONONI
THE WINTER COUNTS (WE 'LL STILL BE HERE!)

FY 7067

885016706722
Felmay Records
Italia

 

TIZIANO TONONI has always been a thinking drummer, and since he started hitting the scene in the late 70’s, he gave evidence to have a project-oriented approach to music. In the case of Winter Counts (We’ll Still Be Here!), a double CD released by Felmay Records, he not only confirms this peculiar feature, but makes it more evident than ever, placing this work in the wake of his previous opuses, with which he had gained a wide appreciation both nationally and internationally. The likes of “Awake Nu – A Tribute To Don Cherry, a double CD from 1996 - Critics Poll Winner in the magazines MusicaJazz and Musica&Dischi – We Did It, We Did It – Rahsaan & The None – triple-CD from 2000 dedicated to the figure of Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Critics Poll Winner in MusicaJazz and Musica&Dischi, the double-CD “The Nexus Orchestra 2001 feat. Roswell Rudd and the trilogy Peace Warriors/Air Sculptures of the years 2004, 2006 and 2017 dedicated to the music of Ornette Coleman, all show Tononi’s talent in re-proposing these materials in a personal and intriguing fashion. Winter Counts comes as a concept-album dedicated to the facts that marked the more recent history of the Native American People in North America.


Winter Counts comes as as a concept-album dedicated to the facts that marked the more recent history of the Native American People in North America, from the oblivion they were convicted to during a consistent part of the 20th century, to the re-birth of both a new and different self-consciousness and a Native identity, to be preserved and enhanced, an identity that brings very important and current messages, as to be the keepers of the land – Unci Maka for the Lakotas, the great Mother Land – and not her owners, not even her voracious exploiters, as the Whites turned out to be from their appearance in what they called the New World. Even in this case, TONONI doesn’t give up with his musical identity, and he speaks and explores here different languages, and keeps them in a fruitful balance through his sensitivity, the heritage of the great examples that inspired him from the very beginning, from Kirk to the Art Ensemble Of Chicago, from Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa to Don Cherry and Gato Barbieri, to Coltrane and Sun Ra in their third-world musical vision. Here the Blues meets the Afro-inspired devotional music, and the free improv conjures and conjugates with the groove, for a metric view of the music that gets ideas from the more advanced instances of contemporary jazz, offering at the same time a melodic breath that helps make emotional some of the episodes of this almost “cinematic” epic tale. With this in mind, and to do so, TONONI availed himself of the essential contribution of an extraordinary working unit, that shared with him a common vision and feelings/messages spread by this music, and they all gave a decisive contribution to the final picture...Marta Raviglia’s voice, Emanuele Parrini’s Violin/guitar sound, the reeds of Piero Bittolo Bon, Giulio Visibelli and Beppe Scardino, the trumpet sound of Gabriele Cancelli, the keyboards and the mallets percussion of PeeWee Durante and Luca Gusella, the 6-string instruments of Bobby Lee Rodgers and Domenico Caliri, and the bass frequencies of Roberto Frassini-Moneta and Joe Fonda. All these fantastic musicians made possible the translation in music of TIZIANO TONONI’s dream, a dream that dates back a decade and that everyone contributed and helped creating, as in the best collective creations, in this case originated by a series of visions… the visions, still today a fundamental part of the Native Americans communities, through which they sublimate the relation with the extraordinarity of the world that surrounds us, and that is calling us all to a non postponeable attention to the health of planet Earth. Their watchword Mitakuye Oyasin (everything is connected)... it should very quickly become ours too.