MESTIZX (NL/US/BO)

The first appearance in Finland of Ibelisse Guardia Ferragutti, a musician, composer and multimedia artist born in Bolivia, will take place on Thursday at the Jazz Happening’s free Netherjazz theme event featuring three ‘Dutch’ ensembles. On Friday, she will bring out her other project band at the newly refurbished Tullikamari. This performance that is also the last act of the day will quite possibly be the highlight of the evening.

The ensemble derives its name, the gender-neutral word Mestizx, from the Spanish colonial term mestizo, which naturally is no coincidence. Both Ibelisse Guardia Ferragutti (b. 1979) and her partner, drummer-composer Frank Rosaly (b. 1974), feel like outsiders left between cultures and identities. Guardia Ferragutti grew up in Portuguese-speaking Brazil, while Rosaly is the offspring of Caribbean and Spanish-speaking immigrants born in Phoenix, Arizona. Today, their shared home is in Amsterdam.

This means that the multi-genre and ‘decolonised’ rhythm music of Mestizx, which has released one album, is biographical and personal from the outset, and for those who know its background, also socially charged. However, the content of the opening event of the Jazz Happening remains a secret at this point, as in the concert at Tullikamari, Mestizx intends to focus on new music from its EP, O, to be released on that day. The duo is turned into a trio by American keyboard player Ben Boye. He has appeared on nearly a hundred albums, including recordings with Rosaly and a band called Natural Information Society.

The concert marking the release of O may also feature a guest, or even several guests, whose identities had not yet been revealed in early September.