Oriol Roca

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Jazz and improvised music drummer born September 1979 in Barcelona, Spain. He studied at the Royal Conservatory in The Netherlands from 2001 until 2005.

He plays in different jazz and improvised music bands in Belgium, France, The Netherlands and Spain with musicians such as Jeroen Van Herzeele, Ben Sluijs, Giovanni di Domenico, Erik Vermeulen, Manolo Cabras, Michal Vanoucek, Joan Diaz, David Mengual, Giulia Valle, Alexandra Grimal, Miguel Fernandez, Masa Kamaguchi, Augusto Pirodda, Vrak’ Trio, Jordi Matas, Didier Labbé, Dani Perez, Riccardo Luppi, Ben Sluijs, Lynn Cassiers, Paolo Angeli and many others. Currently living in Barcelona, where he co-founded CREA improvisation collective in 2007. That same year he was awarded with first prize on Concurs de Jazz de Barcelona with the french band Vrak' Trio.

About the drums solo album La Tomba dei Giganti

Barcelona born drummer Oriol Roca had no intention to release a solo album. He didn’t even plan to perform solo, for that matter. And yet, La Tomba dei Giganti is his first outing under his own name. Once he had played his first solo concert and listened to it afterwards, he realized it was closer to the way he felt about music than anything else he’d ever done before.

It all happened by chance. In August 2009, Paolo Angeli, an amazing Italian improviser currently living in Barcelona, invited Oriol to perform at Isole che Parlano, an arts festival held in the tiny village of Palau, in the Italian island of Sardinia. He asked him to do a solo concert at a very special spot in Palau -right at the foot of a bronze era monument, La tomba dei giganti (Giants’ tomb), erected in 1400BC. Locals strongly believe it is a source of energy with strong healing properties.

Before setting foot in Palau but aware of the connotations of the place, Oriol sketched a plot for what is otherwise a performance of improvised music. It would be a journey of discovery, from sheer sound to dance, music, and then back to sound -only this time around a sound informed by the knowledge acquired along the way. At the end, because the concert took place on his country’s national day - September the 11th- and maybe because he was away from home and he missed it a little, he felt like playing Els segadors, the official Catalan hymn, on a cheap flute someone had brought him as a souvenir from London. He knew none of the people attending the concert, some of them musicians but mostly locals of virtually all ages, would recognize the tune. But it didn’t matter. It moved them all the same. Hence the tittles -Sound, Dance, Music, Life, Wisdom, and Hymn- into which the performance, presented on the album in its entirety and unedited, is divided.

Italian sound engineer Roberto Monari happened to be there with his recording equipment to document the festival. Then someone sent Oriol a copy. Then he listened to it and he was struck to recognize himself so strongly in the music. And that’s how La tomba dei giganti, Oriol Roca’s first ever solo album, recorded on the evening of his first ever solo performance, came to be.

“The music on this recording goes back to an era when the world is still wild and untamed. A time when sounds are so new no one has ever heard them, a time when someone realizes he can arrange and rearrange those sounds and come up with something new. And that is music and it is powerful, for it can make people dance. And after living his life with joy and intensity he goes back to his homeland to share his newfound wisdom with his people. And there he finally rests to the sound of a hymn.” Oriol Roca

DISCOGRAPHY:

MUT TRIO - 2395 (Whataboutmusic/Mosquito Records 2011, Spain)

Refree - Tots Sants (Marxpohone 2012, Spain)

David Mengual - Maitia (Quadrantrecords 2011, Spain)

Vrak' Trio - Crossroads Project (Labelmanivelle 2011, France)

Piccola Orchestra Gagarin - Platos Combinados (Whataboutmusic / Le Arti Malandrine 2011, Spain/Italy)

Un Tributo a Os Mutantes - El Justiciero Cha, Cha, Cha (Alegro Records / Nacional Records 2010, Brasil/USA/Mexico)

Refree - Matilda (Marxophone 2010, Spain)

Vrak' Trio - 37 avril (Labelmanivelle 2010, France)

Oriol Roca - Tomba dei Giganti (Whataboutmusic 2010, Spain/USA)

Albert Caire - Camins (Rosazul 2010, Spain)

Dave Bianchi - Suburbs of Salt (Whataboutmusic 2010, Spain/USA)

Maarten Swaan - Write me notes (Whataboutmusic 2010, Spain/USA)

Samantha de Siena - Here inside (Whataboutmusic 2010, Spain/USA)

Marc Mena Quartet - You can’t fight against ants (Whataboutmusic 2010, Spain/USA)

MUT Trio -1374 (Whataboutmusic 2009, Spain/USA)

Leslie Helpert - Ulu (Whataboutmusic 2009, Spain/USA)

Vrak' Trio - TLS-BCN Live (Label Manivelle 2008, France)

Dave Bianchi - Baby Disco (Whataboutmusic 2008, Spain/USA)

Anka Koziel Quartet - Tales of the forest (OAP Records 2008, The Netherlands)

Refree - Els Invertebrats (Acuarela 2007, Spain)

Mala Rodriguez & Original Jazz Orchestra - Tengo un trato (Mondo Records 2008 Spain)

Roger Mas & Refree - La soledat (TVC Edicions 2007, Spain)

Immigrasons (Aqua Records/Discmedi 2007, Argentina/Spain)

Per al meu amic... Serrat - Menuda (Discmedi 2007, Spain)

Roger Mas - Mistica domèstica (K Industria 2005, Spain)

Refree - La matrona (Acuarela 2005, Spain)

Chocadelia Internacional - Ranchory (Músiques del Carib 2004, Spain)

UPCOMING ALBUMS:

Giovanni di Domenico - Duets (2011)

Giulia Valle Libera Quintet (Fresh Sound New Talents 2012, Spain)

Santi Careta & Oriol Roca (Whataboutmusic 2012, Spain)

Basic Borg - I wouldn't be sure (El Negocito Records 2012, Belgium)

Julianne Heinemann (2012)

Awards: