ALBUM RELEASED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH MAHORKA NETLABEL (mahorka.org/release/343)

ALBUM VIDEO: www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLF-txCUGuSzugGXvTC7wNgDe_WxciBLv7

Review by Jeff Gburek (also published here: transparent-abelard.blogspot.com/2023/04/regarding-with-ears-and-mind.html)

Shortly into the first track of this new album by George Christian, my ears really stood up at attention because that one modulation was like a step up, through a mountain pass, a kind of Balboan or Magellanic discovery moment, where I could suddenly see the previously unseen, via unknown modulation. And the whistle and the pauses. Sudden potentiating silences. It's George's sound but something else. O Vento is the song.

It's a traditional song, George tells me later. "Thanks to Caymmi, indeed. I respected his original intention as best as possible. The real difference between his version and mine is the guitar arrangement."
The new album runs a gamut. I've been wanting to speak more with him and you all about this deeper folkloric level in the work which appeals to me immensely and really comes into pirmo piano here -- I feel something very aboriginal emerging there and when the playing relaxes into the slow-paced acoustic space it lingers and mingles with some hackle hairs in the back of my geological memory mind also -- really nice to feel the woodiness of the guitar -- the resonant ping of strings slightly sitar-ical, it's a sound that evolves from the hollows of trees where brid's nests weave --
"I have been dealing with this aboriginal factor in my guitar sound since I became very conscious about the indigenous influence in the Moda de Viola or in the Northeastern Repente. Somehow the fact of the increasing exploration of percussivity in my sound made my guitar even more African. So, I can tell you that this is a way to tell you my guitar might be from the urban seaside of the city, but aims to tell stories that are also talking from the roots of the countryside."

I think I'd always felt this spirit emerging from this acoustic instrument and his sense of how it belongs there, connected to the playa and the trees, although sometimes he gets get crazy with swampy reverb, delays or accompaniment where the guitar is lost inside a participatory dionysian joy, the guitar tossed on waves of a greater musical frenzy -- and there is a bit of that later in this album too -- a few longish polyinstrumental freakouts I have not been able to analyze carefully -- for lack of time. But overall it's the earthiness of the guitar breathing resonance and old stories and ghost voices that on this last record now hits home, or finds its home inside me, at minimum.

Also on my mind recently is the album George made with Michael Sill which I've been wanting to write about but this recommendation will have to suffice -- these works are filled with a global dynamics -- folklore in the quantum space-age -- ecological evocations -- aspirations to earthly energies -- africa, brazil, australia, india -- the sounds are earthy and all about roots or routes -- when I can smell some palo santo --- sandalwood -- rare and precious things -- I appreciate this unadorned presencing of naked growing undetermined essences --

While Europe is obsessed with technology, commerce and war, it' a relief. Enough of my babble. Listen for yourself.

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Introdução de George Christian

"Nothingness, ou... O Vento" é um álbum que demorou a ser descoberto e a surgir. Seu verdadeiro início se deu durante a pandemia de COVID-19, em 2021, em que buscava uma nova sonoridade na minha guitarra durante o período de isolamento auto-imposto. A pandemia recuou e um novo período político se iniciou em meu país, o Brasil, em 2023. O álbum fala indiretamente sobre esse período de transição, tanto quanto é um reflexo da minha própria vontade de viver fazendo música.

Graças à minha amiga artista Iarly Patricio, tive a epifania de um álbum que poderia lançar tendo a sua figura esculpida em carvão como capa. A arte da capa combina a imagem de um rosto e uma representação em I.A. de um quadro baseado na arte do pintor William Turner. A música foi gravada esporadicamente de fevereiro de 2021 até janeiro de 2023. Fruto dessa pesquisa individual, este é um álbum bastante percussivo, mesmo tendo mais ruído, com drones e momentos elétricos no final. Busquei fazer uma mistura entre o novo blues do deserto africano com uma guitarra percussiva brasileira com ele, tanto quanto trabalhar na exploração de diferentes texturas.

O ponto de partida como inspiração conceitual para o álbum é a música “O Vento” de Dorival Caymmi. Eu o leio como uma invocação mística e, ao mesmo tempo, muito naturalista, tanto do vento quanto do trabalho dos pescadores. Tanto em seus empreendimentos (“peixe que dá dinheiro”) quanto em seus obstáculos (“vento que vira o barco”). Considero o violão de Caymmi nas “Canções Praieiras”, coletânea de canções que lançou em 1949, de certa forma um precursor espiritual da música para violão que venho buscando cristalizar como minha ao longo dos anos. E o fato de eu estar morando na região que ele viveu e teve a inspiração de tais canções reforça a ligação espiritual que tenho com ele.

“Nothingness, ou… O Vento” tem uma progressão que vai de sons concretos, naturalistas, a sons mais abstratos. Ainda é um álbum de guitarra no coração. No entanto, dá espaço também a outros instrumentos para enriquecer a narrativa e o conceito. Sou o único músico aqui, mas a inspiração que tirei de Caymmi ou de minha amiga mencionada acima torna o álbum menos solitário do que é. Desintegração é o tema chave do álbum. Não se trata apenas da força do vento, mas também da forma como o vento desintegra o que é sólido, move mares e muda vidas. E, assim, vou cantando e tocando esses sons como uma esperança de mudanças na nossa forma de viver e, claro, ouvir música com novos ouvidos.

Introduction by George Christian

"Nothingness, ou... O Vento" is an album that took a long time to be discovered and to arise. Its real beginning came during the pandemic of COVID-19, in 2021, in which I was searching for a new sound in my guitar playing during the self-imposed isolation period. The pandemic has had its retreat, as well as a new political period has started in my country, Brazil, in 2023. The album indirectly speaks about this transitional period, as much as it’s a reflection of my own urge of living through music-making.

Thanks to my friend artist Iarly Patricio, I’ve had an epiphany of an album I could release having her charcoal carving picture as a cover. The cover art blends her picture of a face and an A.I. representation of a picture based upon the art of the painter William Turner. The music was recorded sporadically from February 2021 until January 2023. As a result of such individual research, this is a very percussive album, even when having noises, with drones and electric moments by the end. I aimed to make a blend between the new African desert blues with a percussive Brazilian guitar with it, as much as working on the exploration of different textures.

The starting point as a conceptual inspiration for the album is the song “O Vento” by Dorival Caymmi. I read it as a mystical and, at the same time, very naturalistic invocation of the wind as much as of the work of the fishermen. Both in its ventures (peixe que dá dinheiro = fish that bring money) and obstacles (Vento que vira o barco = Wind that turn the ship). I consider Caymmi’s guitar playing on “Canções Praieiras” (“Songs of the Beach”), a collection of songs that he released in 1949, somehow as a spiritual precursor to the guitar music I’ve been aiming to crystalize as my own throughout the years. And the fact that I’m living in the region that he once lived and had the inspiration of such songs reinforces the spiritual linkage that I have with him.

“Nothingness, ou… O Vento” has a progression that comes from concrete, naturalistic sounds, to more abstract ones. It’s still a guitar album at heart. However, it gives room also for other instruments to enrich the narrative and the concept. I’m the sole musician here, but the inspiration that I’ve taken from Caymmi or my aforementioned friend makes the album less lonesome than it is. Disintegration is the key theme of the album. It's not only all about the power of the wind, but also the way the wind disintegrates what’s solid, moves seas and changes lives. And, so, I’m singing and playing these sounds as a hope of changes in our way of living and, of course, listening to music with new ears.