”Music with plants, plants with Music” is the motto of the Grand Sound Fishing of the school year 2016/2017, comprehending explanatory experiences that aim at the simbiosis between Music, body, plants, listening and space. In this concert we will share the research we have been making with and from plants, the dialogues with leaves and winds and the sonorities that we found from the root to the flower. The Prelude, this first concert of the Grand Sound Fishing, has as title: Tuning of the Seeds. It’s aimed at parents, children, families and whoever wants to come and listen to the garden. Free admission, but limited to the seats available.

The cycle dedicated to Jazz New Talents is now on its third edition inviting this time the guitar player from Porto Mané Fernandes.

First the voice, then the saxophone, and at the third edition of the project, Orquestra Jazz de Matosinhos choses the guitar and invites one of its most talented representatives to perform with the big band as a soloist. The invited guitar player is Mané Fernandes, 26 years old musician that has been having a very active participation in the present jazz scene. Born in Porto, he studied guitar with Peixe (Ornatos Violeta, Pluto and Zelig) and later took his degree at the Superior School of Music and Performance Arts of Porto, where he studied with Nuno Ferreira and Virxilio da Silva, concluding the final recital with the top evaluation of 20. He received a honourable mention in the 2010 edition of the São Luiz Jazz Fest, as part of the winning combo in the superior schools competition. He was part of the collective SV, award-winning at the 15th edition of the Young Musicians Prize in the combo jazz category.

Mané Fernandes’s first album under his own name came out in November 2014 – BounceLab. He is preparing to launch his first trio album (with Manuel Brito on the bass and Iago Fernández on the drum) and a free improvisation quintet (with João Barradas on the accordion, João Moreira on the trumpet, Demian Cabaud on the bass and Marcos Cavaleiro on the drum). He is very active in the Portuguese musical scene and has played with its BounceLab at Casa da Música within the festival Spring ON!, in 2014.

The programme chosen for this concert includes the original theme by Mané Fernandes – Le Tunka – and an arrangement by himself for na emblematic theme by Wayne Shorter – Yes or No. Scores by Portuguese authors stand out with two original themes by the OJM directors which go back to the first stage of the big band’s existence – Sargaço by Pedro Guedes and Why Not by Carlos Azevedo – and a defiant composition by João Paulo Esteves da Silva titled Certeza, from the middle 1990s (with arrangement by Carlos Azevedo). The alignment is complete with theme chosen from the immense repertoire that OJM has been interpreting throughout the years: Three and One by Thad Jones, a milestone name of the modern writing for jazz orchestra; Tremor by the german pianist Florian Ross; and Use of Light by the guitar player Kurt Rosenwinkel (arrangement by P. Guedes).

After a 3 years pause, Orquestra Jazz de Matosinhos and the piano player and composer João Paulo Esteves da Silva share once more the stage. This time in Serbia, where they are part of the 32nd. edition’s programme of the renowned Belgrade Jazz Festival.

The programme of the concert includes themes by João Paulo Esteves da Silva, with arrangements by Carlos Azevedo - “Certeza”, “Bela Senão Sem” and “Moche Salyo Miariam” -, by Pedro Guedes - “Tristo", “Fado Menor” and “Canção Açoriana” -, and a seventh theme, “A Candeia”, written and orchestrated by the piano player himself.

Interlude to the Galleon gathers all the creative work that was developed along the Grand Sound Fishing throughout the school year of 2015/2016. Under the idea of “Mission to the Bottom of the Sea”, the musical, visual and literary work combines more or less conventional material and ideas that might be said aim to mirror and make the creative process an inclusive one, where everyone may find new ways of relating with Art and particularly with Music. Interlude to the Galleon is a concert that florished along several months and where co-exist soundscapes, conventional jazz themes, melodies and original scores, amateur musicians, professional musicians, students, children, schoolteachers, as well as a lively dialogue of music with word and image. The show reflects the creative process developed along the sessions oriented by the facilitators of LabJázzica – OJM’s educational services – on a journey that took us from the surface to the bottom of the sea to search for sounds, treasures, animals, silences, people and, finally, emerge with findings on Music and ourselves.

Orquestra Jazz de Matosinhos continues its investment in new talents with the soloist João Mortágua.

The cycle OJM dedicates to young soloists who have conquered a relevant position within the national jazz context comes to its forth concert. On the 20th February at 9:30 pm, at the Cine-Teatro Constantino Nery, the night is dressed by the warm sounds of a saxophone player that has been praised by the critique, especially since the launching of his first album under his own name – Janela [Window] (Carimbo Porta-Jazz, 2014). Born in Estarreja and having initially studied piano and saxophone in the Aveiro Music Conservatory, he later turned to jazz in which he graduated at ESMAE – School of Music and Performing Arts. There, he quickly marked himself out by taking part of the Septet award-winning at the São Luiz Jazz Fest 2007. The years that followed, we can easily find him in various jazz clubs and festivals, or in the records of musicians such as Miguel Moreira, Nuno Ferreira, Mané Fernandes, pLoo de Paulo Costa, Filipe Teixeira, Alexandre Coelho, Marcel Proust or Fanfarra Káustica.

The programme of the concert will bring some absolute novelties to the orchestra’s repertoire, with obvious highlight on both themes from Mortágua’s record that will have new arrangements for big band – revealing another OJM bet, this time on the new arrangers. The themes are Girândola [Girandole] and Voo [Flight], and the arrangers are AP Neves and Zé Pedro Coelho. Afterwards we will be offered a parade of some of the most famous names in the writing for this format. Thus, an arrangement by Gil Evanson for a theme by Charlie Parker brings to memory the historical album New Bottle Old Wine, from 1958, that had Cannonball Aderly as main soloist. The unstoppable energy of “GG Train” takes us to Mingus Ah Um time, not a less historical album by Charles Mingus. Then Mortágua and OJM sail through themes by a set of great composers known for their crucial role in the construction of the modern sonority of the jazz orchestras – from Bob Brookmeyer to Maria Schneider, to John Hollenbeck. All this without forgetting, naturally, the music of OJM’s directors, Pedro Guedes and Carlos Azevedo.

Orquestra Jazz de Matosinhos (OJM) shares once again the stage with Mayra Andrade, whose warm and stylish voice has been conquering the world since her first album.

Once again in the company of Kurt Rosenwinkel, we travel to Austria to present Our Secret World at the renowned venue Wiene Konzerthaus.