THE SILK ROAD

ARIA

Albert Hera, an amazing jazzman specialized in solo and choral improvisation, could be described as a "Sound Teller": he has focused his artistic research on the study of traditional world music, with particular attention to vocal and choral practices. Using invented onomatopoeic languages he imitates and reproduce the traditional sounds and rhythms of nature, language and music of specific countries drawing suggestive pictures of those remote landscapes: his improvisations are able to evoke places, perfumes, flavours, dances and exotic people entwined in musical lines that tell ancestral stories and passions everyone could find himself in, far beyond the power of words. His incessant exploration, his strong root in jazz music and his amazing ability to interweave intriguing sound-tales leads to the creation of a new musical genre: the Epic Jazz.
His passion and need of going beyond formal restrictions leads him to a continuous deepening of voice possibilities. Since 2005 he has taken part to the Biennial International Conference of Phoniatrics and Voice Therapy "The Artistic Voice" and actively contributed to researches directed to a better understanding of the anatomy and function of vocal production, in collaboration with international experts as Dott. Franco Fussi, Alfonso Maccarini and Alfonso Borragan. Putting art to use in science, Hera continuously feeds his introspective and vocal research, attitude that makes his singing always dynamic and in constant, rapid evolution.
In reason of his great technical-stylistic competence and of his remarkable human and pedagogical sensitivity, he is considered one the most capable and reputed singing teacher in Italy. His clinics are highly required in Italy and, recently, also abroad.
In 2009 he collaborated with the renowned jazzman Bobby McFerrin to his project "Bobble", first presented at the Stimmen Festival. In 2010 he was again invited by McFerrin to sing in 4 of the 7 tracks included in his ambitious opera "VOCAbuLarieS", nominated to three Grammy Awards and winner of the Image Awards as best Word Music Album.
Thanks to this encounter he found a new artistic impulse. He was one of the first vocalists to carry in (and across) Italy CircleSongs workshops. He worked a lot to build a personal approach to this particular kind of artistic performance and he found in it a unique opportunity to combine his research, pedagogic and artist interests: vocal improvisation become a way to improve the singer's ability to explore the incredible range of voice possibilities and to increase his/her sense of control, not much drawing on external technical tips as on his/ her own emotional resources and on the simple, pure pleasure that comes from singing together.
So far Albert Hera has realized CircleSongs concerts in many Italian theatres, with great consent from both audience and critics: "... then, after the silence...", "Sentences" and "Silk Roads". Among his solo singer projects, one of the most relevant is "Simbiosi – tribute to Bobby McFerrin": a personal interpretation of some of McFerrin's musical compositions, performed with both humility and skilfulness, a performance rich of fascinating sonorities and drenched in a such love and passion that the mere research of technical perfection is exceeded.
He has personally produced two albums, "Positive Consciousness" (2005) and "AriA (2011). Other significant collaborations see him as special guest in the London a Cappella Festival 2012 (an event curated by the world-famous 5-time Grammy-winning vocal group the Swingle Singers and Ikon Arts Management) and as the only male singer invited to take part to the last project of the jazz pianist Diego Baiardi, "Bonne Nuit" (2012), next to artists of international importance such as Paolo Fresu, Antonello Salis, Tullio de Piscopo, Stefano Bagnoli, Andrea Dulbecco, Petra Magoni and Patrizia Laquidara.