amaro freitas: sankofa
Francisco Espregueira
Amaro Freitas consolidates his status as one of the most important jazz musicians hailing from Brazil. From the slums of Recife, in the country’s North-East, he has gained international attention with his unique approach to the piano, present in the debut Sangue Negro (2016) and Rasif (2018) that arrived on a wave of instant acclaim. Via Far Out Recordings, Freitas’ new album Sankofa is a spiritual quest into the forgotten stories, ancient philosophies and inspirational figures of Black Brazil. It’s also his most stunning and sincere work to date.
For the 29-year-old pianist and composer, work goes way beyond than sitting at the piano and, with theory and practice, creating music. There’s an imperative behind all that, with a lot of time spent on trying to understand his ancestors, his place, his history, as a Black man in Brazil. With the help of instrumentalists that he knows well, such as Jean Elton on bass and Hugo Medeiros on drums, Amaro Freitas employs intricate rhythmic patterns and time-signature variations as if he was re imagining the ancient designs of his ancestors. It’s clear that he doesn’t work on the surface, with each track being created from ideas that represent people, places and stories. Like the Sankofa bird, whose name titles the album, Freitas looks back, while creating fundamentally contemporary music.
With time on his side, Amaro’s Sankofa album has taken around two years to make, with the trio spending eight hours a day, four days a week in the studio - treasuring the creative process reflected on this impressive piece. Available on vinyl, this is one for the jazz heads.
“The symbol of the mystical bird, which flies with its head back, teaches us the possibility of going back to our roots, in order to realize our potential to move forward. With this album I want to bring a memory of who we are and pay homage to neighborhoods, names, characters, places, words and symbols that come from our ancestors. I want to celebrate where we come from.”