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Marco Lucchi - Tantra à l'usage des anges [wh058]

by: Marco Lucchi

Giampaolo Violi

Publication date: 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Usage: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States

Topics: New Age, Poetry, Spirituality, mysticism, Performance Art, Live Electronic, French

"Tantra à l'usage des anges"

A multimedia performance
Recorded Live in
Carpi at "la Fonoteca"
december 1999
length 00:59:07

Webbed Hand welcomes the work of Marco Lucchi, a noted and very skilled musician who has distinguished himself in Italy for his work in the experimental, new age, and electronica genres.

This album is the audio document of a multimedia performance which took place in 1999, based around the texts of French poet Jean Michel Maulpoix, who took part in this event. The music was composed and performed by Marco Lucchi, with the accompaniment of other musicians and vocalists. The performance was a very visual event too, with dance, lights, and projections.

A central part of this performance was a dance by Alassandra Dallari, which represented the "mudra" alluded to in the title. Here is an explanation of the dance and the poetic texts by Maulpoix, as explained by Marco Lucchi:

"Alassandra Dallari - although you cannot see or hear her - was the mudra - the mudra symbolizes the motive of desire as it is intended in the tantra contemplation... you can imagine an almost acousmatic performance... Alessandra appeared in the middle of the multimedia performance wrapped in a long plastic sheet that she unwrapped along a ten minute slow dance while wrapping the audience with it... at the end of the unwrapping she remained for a second completely naked, just for a second, in a dark blue light.

"The [spoken] words are taken from the book by Jean Michel Maulpoix titled Précis de théologie à l'usage des anges [publ. Editions Fata Morgana] that is a poem in prose with a very reflective and philosophical flavor. The book talks about angels in a very modern - although poetic and evocative - way.

"At about the end of the performance the choir sings some verses taken from "Palme" by Paul Valery:

Patience, patience,
Patience dans l'azur!
Chaque atome de silence
Est la chance d'un fruit mur !
Viendra l'heureuse surprise :
Une colombe, la brise,
L'ébranlement le plus doux,
Une femme qui s'appuie,
Feront tomber cette pluie
Où l'on se jette à genoux !"

Personnel:
Marco Lucchi: electronics, samples, keyboards, 12 strings acoustic guitar and tin whistles
-------with------
Jean Michel Maulpoix: spoken words
Geoff Warren: flute, alto flute and soprano sax
Quinto Grigatti: percussions and noises
Alassandra Dallari: Mudra (a dance performance)
...and the female choir "Corale Savani"
conducted by Giampaolo Violi

Engineered and edited by Giampaolo Violi
Music Composed by Marco Lucchi
Words by Jean Michel Maulpoix (www.maulpoix.net)
from his book Précis de théologie à l'usage des anges
Performance includes verses from "Palme" by Paul Valery
and recorded samples of buddhist chants.

Thank you for listening to this Webbed Hand Records release. Please visit the WHR homepage to explore our complete catalog of experimental and ambient recordings. All of our music is free to download, but we'd be very grateful if you could make a small donation (via Paypal) to help with the costs of maintaining a netlabel.

Notes

Alex Young has written a review of this album:

(here is part of it)

I've written about Marco Lucchi before, and I was pleased to find that Webbed Hand, a netlabel I highly recommend, have released a collection of his tracks from a multimedia performance which took place in 1999.

Tantra à l'usage des anges is an exquisite collection of ambient pieces, with varied instrumentation and vocals. If you judge them at face value, you might easily miss some of the more interesting qualities of these recordings. Yet they evoke quite emotive responses at times, as well as stillness and tranquility as you may assume the title implies.

Tantra à l'usage des anges stands up strongly next to many of the recent release on Webbed Hand and other prominent netlabels. And if you're a fan of electronic music, which is generally the stock fare of current netlabels, you might enjoy the change.
...
See the whole review

~~~~~~~~

Here's a review in Italian (from here:

Marco Lucchi - Tantra à l'usage des anges
E' con un po' di sano campanilismo che accogliamo una delle ultime uscite della netlabel americana Webbed Hand: Tantra à l'usage des anges di Marco Lucchi. E' infatti ancora piuttosto limitata (seppur in netta crescita) la presenza della musica italiana nella costellazione delle licenze Creative Commons. Laureato in estetica al Dams di Bologna, fondatore nel 1994 dell'associazione culturale Musiche Virtuali, con questo disco Lucchi offre la registrazione di uno spettacolo multimediale svoltosi alla Fonoteca di Carpi, nel dicembre del 1999.

Spettacolo multimediale vuol dire: proiezioni, danze, luci. Tutte cose che ovviamente ascoltando un file Mp3 si possono soltanto immaginare. E il merito di Tantra à l'usage des anges forse sta proprio nello spazio lasciato all'ascoltatore, che può arricchire con la propria fantasia visiva il tappeto di suoni ambient che costituiscono il disco. A questi, tanto per confermare la valenza multimediale del progetto, si sommano le rime recitate dal poeta francese Jean Michel Maulpoix (dal cui libro Précis de thèologie à l'usage des anges prende spunto l'opera). Assieme a Maulpoix e Lucchi (tastiere, chitarre, samples), protagonisti della registrazione sono Geoff Warren (flauti, sax soprano), Quinto Grigatti (percussioni) e il coro femminile della Corale Savani, senza dimenticare la presenza/assenza della danzatrice Alessandra Dallari.

Nel panorama di Creative Commons, la Webbed Hand è una delle netlabel più quotate, soprattutto nei terreni in cui la musica d'ambiente si sposa con la filosofia e la spiritualità. Tantra à l'usage des anges è la release numero 58 dell'etichetta ed è consigliato soprattutto a chi ama lasciarsi cullare da sensazioni musicali di tipo new age. Sempre di Lucchi, la Webbed Hand distribuisce anche I found an - insoluble, indefinite - ear, brano unico da 75 minuti registrato con il contributo del figlio Dario al corno francese.