Celebration Ensemble by Agusti Fernandez

The 21st century is the age of post-avant-garde, which is not a trivial post-modern "return to the tradition". Post-avant-garde is for me a creative symbiosis and synergy of all possible genres: ancient and baroque music, 19th century modernism, 20th century classical symphonic and chamber music, classical avantgarde, electronic and electroacoustic music, and avant-garde free jazz and free improvised music - you name it. Post-avant-garde is not eclectic: the focus in the definition is on creativity! If one accepts this, then Agustí is one of the world leaders of the 21st century post-avant-garde, along with Barry Guy, Roscoe Mitchell, Evan Parker, Joe McPhee, Ken Vandermark or Ivo Perelman to name but a few.

Agustí’s Warsaw 4CD box, River Tiger Fire, released by Fundacja Słuchaj! illustrates this wonderfully well, but the present live recording of the Celebration Ensemble confirms it perhaps even better. The concert and Agustí’s 60th birthday, celebrated in a quite extraordinary way, was possible due the generous support of the 2015 GREC Festival de Barcelona. The personnel is completely different from the Polish recording, and so is the music. Despite the presence of the explosive Mats and super-abstract Joe, Agustí’s music carries certain "kindness", lyricism and melancholy in the freely improvised parts. Despite the truly abstract nature, there are also certain similarities (in the piano parts and the composed parts) to some works of John Cage or Pierre Boulez. One can also hear elements of Spanish, or rather Majorcan folk, and minimalism.

The group is joined in the final parts by the incredible dancer, Sònia Sánchez. The sounds generated by her shoes can be particularly well heard in Part 8 and later. Everybody plays fantastic here, but Agustí’s perpetual journeys inside and outside the piano, Nate’s peaceful and tranquilizing trumpet sounds, and Mats’ controlled fusion are particularly impressive. For me a paradigmatic masterpiece of the 21st century post-avant-garde!
Maciej Lewenstein

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