Mediagallery:

The Spiritual Meaning of Sound

For this occasion, using the beautiful reverberation of the Church of S.Caterina, pieces from the repertoire of some of the traditional musical cultures that he has had the opportunity to directly experience will be played, such as the Tuareg, Gnawa, and Mali cultures, as well as pieces inspired by the folklore of other musical traditions.

With “The Spiritual Meaning of Sound” he addresses those who, through listening, are able to experience an inner resonance and thanks to this inner resonance can become aware of the quality (sound) that constitutes our deepest essence.

OREB, the title of the latest project by Dimitri Grechi Espinoza, is another name to indicate Mount Sinai, where Moses met “face to face” with God, in a dialogue that will become incandescent matter for all humanity in the Ten Commandments of the Teaching. But Oreb is also the mountain where the prophet Elijah, tired and disgusted for having killed too much, meets the silent voice of God. The Lord was not in the wind, not in the earthquake, not in the fire; but in a “voice of suspended silence,” barely perceptible to the hearing. It is this quality of silence that is expressed in Dimitri Grechi Espinoza’s Sax solo: a silent space that must be created within oneself before speaking with the Other, before speaking with others.

Gabriella Caramore – host of “Uomini e Profeti” Rai Radio3

DIMITRI GRECHI ESPINOZA was born in Moscow in 1965, attended Jazz Mobile in New York, and completed advanced vocational courses at Siena Jazz with P. Tonolo. In 2000 he founded the musical research group Dinamitri Jazz Folklore, which in 2014 obtained the 2nd place in the Musica Jazz magazine ranking as the best Italian group. In August 2001 he was invited to play at the Pan-African festival in Brazzaville (Congo). From March 2002 to 2003 he collaborated with Goma Parfait Ludovic, director of the Congolese company Yela wa, in the research on the tradition of African healing music with seminars and performances. Since 2004, he has mainly focused on two directions: the application of research results on traditional cultures to the music of the Dinamiti Jazz Folklore group, and the solo concert “Oreb/The Spiritual Meaning of Sound,” in addition to teaching activities. In 2011 he participated in the “Fesival Au Desert” in Mali, and from 2012 to 2014 directed the project “Azalai-Musical Caravan” with which he performed at some of the largest European festivals.

Oreb has been performed in some of the most prestigious Italian locations, including:

• Pantheon (Rome), Battistero S.Giovanni (Pisa), St.Giles Cathedral (Edinburgh), Pinacoteca di Brera (Milan), Chiesa della Grande Madre (Turin), Basilica S.Gaudenzio (Novara)
• Cappella Pazzi (Florence), Planetary (Milan), Battistero S.Giovanni (Volterra), Uffizi Gallery (Florence), Basilica S.Miniato (Florence), Basilica S.Vitale (Ravenna)
• Cisterna Mirabilis (Naples), Duomo Pozzuoli (Naples), Abbey of Rosazzo (Udine), Palazzo Liviano (Padua), Basilica S.Maria delle Grazie (Milan)