We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.
supported by
Mighttheone
Mighttheone thumbnail
KTQ
KTQ thumbnail
Frank Eijsvogels
Frank Eijsvogels thumbnail
Martin Reh
Martin Reh thumbnail
/

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      €7 EUR  or more

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Lovely 20x20cm card case with artwork by Maria Mónica

    Includes unlimited streaming of Sonic Alchemy Suprema via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    shipping out on or around February 5, 2024
    edition of 300

    Includes unlimited streaming of Sonic Alchemy Suprema via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      €15 EUR or more 

     

  • Full Digital Discography

    22
    releases

    Get all 22 Vasco Trilla releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Sonic Alchemy Suprema, Decasia, Eating Poetry, CRITICAL MASS, SINGING ICONS Vasco Trilla - Ra Kalam Bob Moses, Artur Majewski / Vasco Trilla-The End of Something, Century Of The Foam, Spiracle, and 14 more. , and , .

    Purchasable with gift card

      €115.70 EUR or more (35% OFF)

     

1.
Opening 02:16
buy track
2.
One With Infinite Space 05:24
buy track
3.
Alma Ra Kalam 05:14
buy track
4.
An Ominous Odyssey 03:55
buy track
5.
Prayer 05:45
buy track
6.
An Eerie Garden Sighting 01:02
buy track
7.
High Spirits 03:13
buy track
8.
Dusk To Dawn Animalia 02:44
buy track
9.
Cosmic Weaving Loom 07:21
buy track
10.
Plate Waltzing 02:45
buy track
11.
Alma Pedro 03:32
buy track
12.
Animal Instinct 02:45
buy track
13.
Dance Of The Celestial Madmen 02:51
buy track
14.
Alma Vasco 04:33
buy track
15.
Soaring Leaf 03:07
buy track

about

“In 2020, alongside foundational references, the ever-unconventional Ra Kalam Bob Moses posted on a social network a list of some of his recent discoveries of drummers from around the world whom he considered creative and visionary. Among the mentioned names was Melo Alves, who quickly responded, indicating other drummers whose work he believed Ra Kalam could also appreciate. Among these was the Portuguese-Catalan Vasco Trilla. The links were established between three drummers who found in friendship and mutual respect the ideal vehicles to develop creative music through percussion. Thus, Alma Tree was born.

Belonging to different generations, the three musicians navigate through the most stimulating streams of jazz and improvisation. Melo Alves, Ra Kalam, and Trilla are highly skilled rhythm practitioners, idiosyncratic, with unique characteristics that do not dilute but synergistically enhance when engaging in cross-pollination games that are known to originate but never where they flourish.

Ra Kalam Bob Moses is a historic drummer who helped transform the sound of jazz from the late 1960s, playing in groups led by Roland Kirk, Paul Bley, Pat Metheny, Gary Burton, Steve Swallow, or Dave Liebman. Approaching 76 years old, he combines an impressive wealth of experience with an incessant curiosity for what is happening today and for new explorations and directions in music across various realms. Pedro Melo Alves, who engages in projects like The Rite of Trio and the superb Omniae Ensemble, among other encounters in multiple contexts, and Vasco Trilla, a musician with a strong connection to the Polish scene of adventurous jazz and improvised music, are two central figures in the new exploratory percussion, with significant visibility in European circuits.

The trio met in person for the first time at the end of May 2022, during a tour in Portugal. While occasionally playing compositions by Ra Kalam, the trio dedicates itself body and soul to entirely improvised music, exploring all the extended resources of each of their broad percussive universes. Alma Tree is, therefore, a trio with distinctive features, not in terms of instrumentation, but in what these three rhythm alchemists can do with it. A tree of souls whose branches intertwine to strengthen and grow together. (Echoes of Herberto Helder resonate: "We touch each other like the trees of a forest inside the earth.") "Sonic Alchemy Suprema" is the debut record of the trio, released by the Carimbo Porta-Jazz label.

Summoning sounds of unknown origin, the trio challenges space and time, mixing geographies and pointers. A kind of invocation of spirits, the auroral "Opening" serves as an antechamber for "One With Infinite Space", a composition by Ra Kalam with enchanting wind instruments, which we find again in "Prayer," featuring saxophones by Julius Gabriel and José Soares and João Pedro Brandão's flute. The first of three individual exercises is the ritualistic "Alma Ra Kalam"; "An Ominous Odyssey" is a journey to the limits of an imaginary ancestral tribe, "An Eerie Garden Sighting" brings a magical atmosphere, and "Cosmic Weaving Loom" refers to a long and fascinating interstellar journey (not coincidentally, the longest piece on the album). What we hear is often deeply imagistic, like the suggestion of fantastical creatures in "Dusk to Dawn Animalia." "High Spirits" once again summons supernatural beings, and "Plate Waltzing" astonishes with filigree work. "Alma Pedro" reveals an exquisitely rhythmic timepiece, giving way to the thrill that soon takes over in "Animal Instinct." "Dance of the Celestial Madman" transports us to a shamanic ritual, and "Alma Vasco" plunges the listener into a serenely disturbing cloud. "Soaring Leaf" closes the album with high energy levels, mercurial saxophones, and Brandão's pioneering flute. "Sonic Alchemy Suprema" is therefore an exercise in organizing uncertainty, an experience made up of miniatures, ephemeral constructions, small sound branches that intersect, collide, caress, in a kind of emotional knitting with a strong physical presence.

Here we are faced with a monumental celebration of rhythm as a transformative agent of humanity.”

António Branco
Lisbon, January 8th 2024

credits

released February 4, 2024

a Kalam Bob Moses - drums and percussion (right side)
Vasco Trilla - drums and percussion (center)
Pedro Melo Alves - drums and percussion (left side)

Guest artists (tracks 2, 5, 8, 13 and 15)
João Pedro Brandão - alto saxophone and flute (center)
José Soares - alto saxophone (right side)
Julius Gabriel - tenor saxophone (left side)

Recorded by Nuno Couto at CARA OJM Studios, Porto, Portugal on the 30th of May, 2022
Mixed by Pedro Melo Alves
Mastered by Filipe Louro
All music by Alma Tree, except One With Infinite Space and Prayer by Ra Kalam Bob Moses
Photos and video by Adriana Melo
Video editing by Pedro Melo Alves
Artwork and design by Maria Mónica

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Vasco Trilla image

Vasco Trilla Barcelona, Spain

contact / help

Contact Vasco Trilla

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Sonic Alchemy Suprema, you may also like:

Bandcamp Daily  your guide to the world of Bandcamp

On Bandcamp Radio

Featuring Riley Pinkerton (aka The Rat Queen) from the theatrical NYC rockers, Castle Rat.
listen now