BESTIARIO II

THE CIRCLE PROJECT is a project that fuses various musical genres with literature and graphic art. The initial idea came from Ángel G. Lajarín, founder of the Facebook discussion group on progressive rock, art rock and related music named Prog Circle, which has more than four thousand members. He noticed that among the most active members there were many musicians with interesting careers and proposed that they form a collective project to pool their talents beyond geographical barriers, using the Facebook group as a space for communication and work.

BESTIARIO - (BESTIARY)

A first proposal in the form of a rock opera was, perhaps, too ambitious. And was abandoned in favour of Rafael Pacha's suggestion to set a medieval-style bestiary to music.

October 2016 saw the debut album, "Bestiario". It featured several artists from the Spanish music scene resulting in an eclectic, but at the same time coherent work. Mostly thanks to the production and musical direction of multi-instrumentalist Rafael Pacha (San Barandán, La Banda del Lago, MacíaPacha, Last Knight, The Guildmaster, Samurai of Prog, Pacha & Pörsti) in close collaboration with guitarist German Fafian (Axiom9, Axis Ensemble, German Fafian) and Raúl Díaz (Taker 51), keyboards and drums.

It is made up of nine songs full of passages and emotions of meticulous instrumental and vocal musicality, complemented by the lyrics and voiceovers of the writer Ignacio Carlos Romeo Puolakka and the drawings of the imaginary beasts by Ángel G. Lajarín.

The other participants of the first album were: Ana Marín (Psychosound, Axiom9, Axis Ensemble) bass, Javier Herrera (KantFreudKafka, The Logical Group) drums and vocals, José Carballido (A Sombra dos Soños) guitars, vocals and production, Aser Nova drums, DanielF. Campañá (Quorum) vocals, Clara Morant vocals and Amador Gázquez second vocals. The work has the special collaboration of the prestigious guitarist Manoel Macía (Manoel Macía, Los Visionarios, Suárez & Macía, MacíaPacha) and voiceovers by Alexandro Baldassarini.

BESTIARIO II ? (BESTIARY II)

A trip to Seville to visit Antonio Manuel Fernández -Noné Easter- is to blame for the birth of this sequel. This time it boasts the participation of Manuel Soto Noly (Mártires del Compás, Malabriega, Blasphemous, Graci Rodríguez Band, Manuel Soto Noly) on acoustic guitar, keyboards and drum programming, and Noné Easter on electric guitar. During this trip. Noly proposes Patricia García, David Escolano Lajarín and Ángel G. Lajarín, to take up the project again and launches a video to promote it. The suggestion is received with enthusiasm and so it is decided to consult with Rafael and German, who show their happiness for the resurgence of the project.

The same method of calling and working on the initial album through Prog Circle is maintained, and of the twenty-five musicians who were initially interested, the final list is twenty, some of them highly valued on the national and international scene. For the second time Rafael Pacha was in charge of supervision, production and musical direction, as well as composition and playing several instruments.

"Bestiario II" brings together thirteen new fantastic creatures, described by the narrators Alexandro Baldassarini and María José Vaquero Pichu and performed by, in addition to Rafael, German, Raúl, Carballido, Noly and Noné Easter, Carlos Aguilera (Troubled Mind) synthesizers, Paco Asensi (ex-Moebius, Paco Asensi) keyboards and drums, Alessandro di Benedetti (Mad Crayon, Inner Prospekt) keyboards, Mario Bocanegra (Qamar) drums, Pablo Canalís (Senogul, Otus Scops) ocean and water sounds, keyboards, conch shell, waterphone, Native American flute and bass, José Cifuentes (Moebius) flute and sax, Chus Gancedo (United Progressive Fraternity) drums, Óscar García (Project Claudia) drums and percussion, Alberto Mateos (Project Claudia) bass, guitar, keyboards and mandolin, Alicia Pacha vocals, Alfonso Romero (El Tubo Elástico) Chapman stick and bass, Joaquín Sáinz (Malabriega, Joaquín Sáinz) electric guitar, Cochè Vil (Cochè Vil Band, Costas) electric guitar and Claudia Zurdo (Project Claudia) vocals.

Ángel discovers a drawing of a late 16th century map by Urbano Monte, a planisphere divided into sixty sheets and recently assembled in digital format by David Rumsey for the Stanford Libraries Map Collection. It is a mysterious map, very accurate for the time, depicting areas and animals never before seen on our planet, which makes it an ideal album cover. It also illustrates the thirteen beasts that make up the work.

Executive production is handled by the famous Madre Mine Records & Tapes sub-label, popularly known as Hamaca Brothers Records -for those albums that have to wait, you know...-, formed on this occasion by Paco Asensi, Paco Barroso, Carlos Duro, Pedro Enrique Esteban, Patricia García, Ángel Gómez, Rafael Pacha, Miguel Rodríguez and Alfonso Romero. Javier Cremades is the author of the video edition.

You can listen to and buy "Bestiario II" on Bandcamp: thecircleproject.bandcamp.com/album/bestiario-ii

Our social networks (for now): facebook.com/thecircleprojectmusic www.youtube.com/@thecircleprojectband