Grammy-winning cellist and singer Mike Block returns to the Connecting Chords Music Festival on Thursday, Sept. 24, at 7 p.m. in Bell's Back Room, just a year after his group Djékady brought the audience to its feet there. This time he brings Biribá Union, a trio with Washington, D.C., beatboxer, rapper and guitarist Christylez Bacon and electric bassist Patricia Ligia of Montevideo, Uruguay.
"I love cross-cultural collaborations," Block tells Cara Lieurance. The three musicians meet through the Global Musician Workshop, an initiative that grew out of the Silk Road Ensemble founded by Yo-Yo Ma nearly 25 years ago. A shared love of Brazilian music draws them together, and everything they play is co-composed. Their debut album, Passing Go, came out this summer. "It is hard to describe, but I can guarantee you that it's very full of positivity and excitement," Block says.
He describes Bacon as "a magical unicorn of an artist" whose beatboxing works like a global percussionist's. Bacon travels to Brazil every summer and speaks fluent Portuguese. Ligia, who studied industrial design before attending Berklee College of Music, has become an in-demand pop bassist, playing for Karol G and touring with Ricardo Montaner and Matteo Bocelli. Block sings lead and plays cello, but the roles are fluid. "At any given moment, in any tune or in any arrangement within a tune, we can swap roles and different people can take the lead one after another," he says.
Block also performs on a 3D-printed carbon fiber cello made by Forte3D, which he has played for about two and a half years, including in classical chamber music. He values its durability and affordability. "As a traveling musician it just makes my life so much easier," he says.
The band takes its name from the biribá, a Brazilian fruit. After Kalamazoo, the trio plays the Dogwood Center in Fremont on Friday, then heads to Keene, New Hampshire, and Tarrytown, New York, for a collaboration with Carnegie Hall's Ensemble Connect. The group plans to write new music at a retreat next week. Festival details are at connectingchordsfestival.com.
The interview was summarized by Claude AI and edited by the author.
