Cibelle
Encyclopedia
Cibelle is a multi-media performance artist, singer-songwriter and music producer. Cibelle’s music is difficult to classify; she has been called a self-styled purveyor of “Tropical Punk”.
, Brazil
, 2 January 1978, and now resides in east London, UK. She attended Marcelo Tupinamba Conservatory in São Paulo from the age of 6, where she studied guitar, piano, percussion and theatre.
Cibelle had a short career modeling in her teens, but left it to dedicate herself to acting until her early twenties. Cibelle worked in musicals, short films, and Brazilian TV, until music took a stronger lead in her life.
After meeting the Serbia
n-born producer Suba
in a bar, she appeared as the main vocalist on his album, São Paulo Confessions, on Ziriguiboom (Crammed Discs
' Brazilian imprint) in 1999. It was a mixture of traditional and electronic sounds which has been said to be years ahead of the Brazilian Electronic music boom. São Paulo Confessions is regarded as an important precursor and a landmark album for Brazilian Electronic Music. Suba died shortly after the album’s release.
Cibelle next appeared on Celso Fonseca
’s album, Natural (2003). Cibelle’s first solo album, Cibelle, was also released in 2003. Signed to Belgian record label Crammed Discs at the age of 22, she started spending more and more time in Europe, specifically Paris. By the completion of her first album, she moved to London's Brick Lane
, and has since been moving around East London.
The performances usually happen in trios; her band is made of around 10 musicians or more that at each time combine themselves as trios depending on the country of performance. Her latest performances ranged from having two drum kits on stage, to having none at all. Each of her concerts are unique and the public never know exactly what to expect as far as shape and form.
Cibelle works by building tracks live on stage, welcoming special guests and inviting the audience to contribute to her ”bric-a-brac DIY” sound through sweet vocals, creative playfulness and lots of instrumental experimentation. Since moving to Dalston
, Cibelle has been working more with visual arts and performance, taking part in the abravanista movement with Rick Castro - also a part of assume vivid astro focus
- and collaborating as a part of collective and artzine FUR.uk.com, ran by photographer Cassia Cabatini and artist/printmaker Fabio Gurjao.furzine She is also a part of Supine Studios, a collective of artists/musicians based in Dalston.
In visual arts, she sometimes takes on other names, and mostly goes by Sonja Khalecallon, working with GIF
animation, collages, multimedia pieces, videos, performances and vivid anatomic looking watercolors.
, Seu Jorge
, Cocorosie
, Rio en Medio
, Gilberto Gil
, Junio Barreto, Vanessa da Mata
, Orquestra Imperial
, Vetiver
, Lightspeed Champion
, Josh Weller
, David Shrigley
, Doug Aitken
, Vanessa da Silva, Adem, Tom Ze
, Johnny Flynn
, Quist
, Tunng
, members of Nação Zumbi
and The Legendary Tigerman
. The video for her version of Tom Waits
' Green Grass, directed by long time friend Gustavo Guimaraes and Adams Carvalho, had over a million views on YouTube
.
"Each song is a joyous little daydream…It's chock full of goodness… Traversing the globe with charming agility, Cibelle gives us one more reason not to roll our eyes at chameleonic songstresses" (Stylus, USA)
"A sophisticated trilingual pop record, spinning twitchy electronics, American freak-folk and Brazilian traditions into a glittering tableau. All the more radiant for their partial construction, Cibelle's songs are marked by a billowing drift, with pliant, meandering melodies and progressions that seem less linear than mutational, evolving toward realization by gradual degrees" (Pitchfork, USA)
"Innovating on old-world beauty. Cibelle crafts tunes that tell stories embellished by an instrumentation that won't disappoint. Her approach to song construction reminds me of The Books and Psapp" (Aurgasm, USA)
"A delightful surprise to those who enjoy their music heady as well as luscious, and with a literate, worldly edge" (Allmusic, USA)
"She's a canny pop amalgamator, experimenting with soundscapes but never forgetting about tunes… Even when her music is most borderless and surreal, she never sounds disoriented. She navigates with a melodic grace that's purely Brazilian" (The New York Times, USA)
"A playfully trippy excursion full of unexpected twists. She infuses her songs and performances with a sense of discovery" (The Boston Globe, USA)
"She's found the recipe for delicate and tasty music which blend songwriting and cutting-edge wizardry… A rich palette of colours and heady perfumes. Gifted with sensitive and powerful antennaes, she transforms all the informations which she absorbs to create a universal language" (Les Inrockuptibles, France)
"With the delicate fingers of a fairy, she can sculpt a variety of sounds generated by lighters, plastic cups, guitars or Fender Rhodes... Inventive and sensual, she carved 14 tracks which are as many miniature worlds, which reveal more charm and details with each listen" (Elle Magazine, France)
Biography
Cibelle Cavalli was born in Sao PauloSão Paulo
São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...
, Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, 2 January 1978, and now resides in east London, UK. She attended Marcelo Tupinamba Conservatory in São Paulo from the age of 6, where she studied guitar, piano, percussion and theatre.
Cibelle had a short career modeling in her teens, but left it to dedicate herself to acting until her early twenties. Cibelle worked in musicals, short films, and Brazilian TV, until music took a stronger lead in her life.
After meeting the Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...
n-born producer Suba
Suba
-Groups of people:*Suba , a people of Kenya**Suba language*Suba , a people of Tanzania-Individual people:*Suba , Mitar Subotić, a Serbian-Brazilian musician*Mihai Șubă, Romanian chess grandmaster-Places:...
in a bar, she appeared as the main vocalist on his album, São Paulo Confessions, on Ziriguiboom (Crammed Discs
Crammed Discs
Crammed Discs is an independent record label whose output blends world music, rock, pop, and electronica. Based in Brussels, Belgium, Crammed was founded in 1980 by Marc Hollander of Aksak Maboul and has since released over 300 albums and 250 singles, working with artists from all over the world...
' Brazilian imprint) in 1999. It was a mixture of traditional and electronic sounds which has been said to be years ahead of the Brazilian Electronic music boom. São Paulo Confessions is regarded as an important precursor and a landmark album for Brazilian Electronic Music. Suba died shortly after the album’s release.
Cibelle next appeared on Celso Fonseca
Celso Fonseca
Celso Fonseca is a Brazilian guitarist and singer. He is noted for samba and Música Popular Brasileira.He began on guitar at age 12 and by 19 dedicated himself to music as a profession. He counts Baden Powell de Aquino as an influence and has worked with Gilberto Gil, Marisa Monte, Bebel Gilberto...
’s album, Natural (2003). Cibelle’s first solo album, Cibelle, was also released in 2003. Signed to Belgian record label Crammed Discs at the age of 22, she started spending more and more time in Europe, specifically Paris. By the completion of her first album, she moved to London's Brick Lane
Brick Lane
Brick Lane is a street in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, in the East End of London. It runs from Swanfield Street in the northern part of Bethnal Green, crosses Bethnal Green Road, passes through Spitalfields and is linked to Whitechapel High Street to the south by the short stretch of...
, and has since been moving around East London.
Music and Methodology
Cibelle works always with concept albums, first imagining a world, and then going to fulfill this world with the appropriate sounds and textures, her albums tend to be dreamy, yet the live performances are strong, loud, with screaming guitars and a heavy load of live sampling.The performances usually happen in trios; her band is made of around 10 musicians or more that at each time combine themselves as trios depending on the country of performance. Her latest performances ranged from having two drum kits on stage, to having none at all. Each of her concerts are unique and the public never know exactly what to expect as far as shape and form.
Cibelle works by building tracks live on stage, welcoming special guests and inviting the audience to contribute to her ”bric-a-brac DIY” sound through sweet vocals, creative playfulness and lots of instrumental experimentation. Since moving to Dalston
Dalston
Dalston is a district of north-east London, England, located in the London Borough of Hackney. It is situated northeast of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London...
, Cibelle has been working more with visual arts and performance, taking part in the abravanista movement with Rick Castro - also a part of assume vivid astro focus
Assume Vivid Astro Focus
assume vivid astro focus is both an alias of Brazilian-born New York-based artist Eli Sudbrack, and the name of an international group of visual and performance artists, with French multimedia artist Christophe Hamaide-Pierson one of the main collaborators...
- and collaborating as a part of collective and artzine FUR.uk.com, ran by photographer Cassia Cabatini and artist/printmaker Fabio Gurjao.furzine She is also a part of Supine Studios, a collective of artists/musicians based in Dalston.
In visual arts, she sometimes takes on other names, and mostly goes by Sonja Khalecallon, working with GIF
GIF
The Graphics Interchange Format is a bitmap image format that was introduced by CompuServe in 1987 and has since come into widespread usage on the World Wide Web due to its wide support and portability....
animation, collages, multimedia pieces, videos, performances and vivid anatomic looking watercolors.
Collaborations
Cibelle has collaborated with a range of music and visual artists all over the world for recordings, film, performance, and installation, including: Devendra BanhartDevendra Banhart
Devendra Obi Banhart is a singer-songwriter and visual artist. Banhart was born in Houston, Texas and was raised by his mother in Venezuela, until he moved to California as a teenager. He began to study at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1998, but dropped out to perform music in Europe, San...
, Seu Jorge
Seu Jorge
Seu Jorge is a Brazilian musician, singer/songwriter and actor. Born Jorge Mário da Silva, he was raised in a favela in the city of Belford Roxo in the Baixada Fluminense region of Rio de Janeiro state. He is considered by his fans a renewer of Brazilian pop samba...
, Cocorosie
CocoRosie
CocoRosie is a musical group formed in 2003 by sisters Bianca "Coco" and Sierra "Rosie" Casady. The sisters were born and raised in the United States, but formed the band in Paris after meeting for the first time in years...
, Rio en Medio
Rio en Medio
Rio en Medio is the pseudonym of singer and baritone ukulelist Danielle Stech-Homsy.-Background:Born in the high desert of New Mexico, Danielle later made Brooklyn her home and there began to record and perform her own compositions...
, Gilberto Gil
Gilberto Gil
Gilberto Passos Gil Moreira , better known as Gilberto Gil or , is a Brazilian singer, guitarist, and songwriter, known for both his musical innovation and political commitment...
, Junio Barreto, Vanessa da Mata
Vanessa da Mata
Vanessa da Mata - with full name Vanessa Sigiane da Mata Ferreira - is a Latin Grammy Award-winning Brazilian MPB singer, songwriter...
, Orquestra Imperial
Orquestra Imperial
Orquestra Imperial is a Brazilian Big Band formed in 2002 with the objective of recreating the typical Gafieira Samba sound. The group brought together notable names from the new Carioca pop scene such as Rodrigo Amarante , Moreno Veloso, Domenico and Kassin , Nina Becker, Thalma de Freitas, Max...
, Vetiver
Vetiver
Chrysopogon zizanioides, commonly known as vetiver , is a perennial grass of the Poaceae family, native to India. In western and northern India, it is popularly known as khus. Vetiver can grow up to 1.5 metres high and form clumps as wide. The stems are tall and the leaves are long, thin, and...
, Lightspeed Champion
Lightspeed Champion
Devonté Hynes , better known as Lightspeed Champion or Blood Orange, is a British composer, songwriter, producer and author, who has written for artists such as Florence and the Machine, Diana Vickers and The Chemical Brothers on their 2007 Grammy award winning album We Are The Night...
, Josh Weller
Josh Weller
Josh Weller is a British singer-songwriter/pop singer from London.-Career:Weller's first single "Pretty Girls" was released in 2008, followed by the "Push E.P" in 2009. Both releases sold out, with "Push E.P" entering the UK independent singles at number 11...
, David Shrigley
David Shrigley
-Life and career:Shrigley was born in Macclesfield on 17 September 1968, the younger of two children born to Rita and Joseph Shrigley. Shrigley grew up in Oadby, Leicestershire, England...
, Doug Aitken
Doug Aitken
-Early life and career:Doug Aitken was born in Redondo Beach, California in 1968. In 1987, he initially studied magazine illustration with Philip Hays at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena before graduating in Fine Arts in 1991. He moved to New York in 1994 where he had his first solo...
, Vanessa da Silva, Adem, Tom Ze
Tom Zé
Tom Zé is a songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer who was influential in the Tropicália movement of 1960s Brazil. After the peak of the Tropicália period, Zé went into relative obscurity: it was only in the 1990s, when the musician and label head David Byrne discovered an album recorded...
, Johnny Flynn
Johnny Flynn
Johnny Flynn & The Sussex Wit are an English folk rock band signed to Transgressive Records. They are fronted by Johnny Flynn , an actor, poet and songwriter who cites W.B. Yeats and Shakespeare among his influences...
, Quist
Quist
Quist, sometimes also spelled -kvist in its compound versions is a Swedish surname meaning 'twig, branch.' Quist may refer to:-People:* Adrian Quist , Australian tennis player* Anne Quist , Dutch rower...
, Tunng
Tunng
Tunng are an experimental folk band from the United Kingdom.The band is often associated with the folktronica genre due to the electronic influences evident in some of their work.-Biography:...
, members of Nação Zumbi
Nação Zumbi
Nação Zumbi is a Brazilian rock band formed by Chico Science. The musicians of the group continued as Nação Zumbi after Chico died in a car accident on February 2, 1997....
and The Legendary Tigerman
The Legendary Tigerman
The Legendary Tigerman is the artistic name of Paulo Furtado, a Portuguese blues performer in a one-man-band style. With a singular style, Furtado plays guitar, harmonica and drums alone on stage....
. The video for her version of Tom Waits
Tom Waits
Thomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
' Green Grass, directed by long time friend Gustavo Guimaraes and Adams Carvalho, had over a million views on YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
.
Albums
- Cibelle (2003)
- The Shine of Dried Electric Leaves Six Degrees RecordsSix Degrees RecordsSix Degrees Records is an independent record label noted for its catalog of recordings from international musicians and vocalists. It has been described by the journalist and producer Derek Beres as "one of the most groundbreaking labels of the past decade."...
(2006) (cover art by Cibelle) - Las Vênus Resort Palace Hotel (2010)
EPs
- About a Girl EP (2005)
- Noite de Carnaval/Matthew Herbert Remixes (2005)
- Green Grass EP (2007)
- White Hair EP (2008)
Collaborations
- São Paulo Confession by Suba (1999): vocals on 3 tracks
- Tributo by Suba (2002): vocals on 4 tracks
- O Cheiro do RaloO Cheiro do RaloO Cheiro do Ralo is a movie based in a novel by Lourenço Mutarelli directed by Heitor Dhalia, starring Selton Mello. The film was produced by Geração Conteúdo, Primo Filmes & RT Features.- Plot :...
OST (2006) - Electric Gypsyland (2006): 1 track by Kocani Orkestar remixed by Cibelle
- Res Inexplicata Volans by Apollo Nove (2005): vocals on 3 tracks
- Worried Noodles (TomLab Records): 1 original track (2008)
- Femina by The Legendary Tiger Man (2009): vocals on 2 tracks
Media Reaction to "The Shine Of Dried Electric Leaves"
"Haunted, cut-up, serenely twinkling electro-acoustic folk-pop… This is my ideal sound and you need to hear it now because then it will be your ideal sound too" (Pop Matters, USA)"Each song is a joyous little daydream…It's chock full of goodness… Traversing the globe with charming agility, Cibelle gives us one more reason not to roll our eyes at chameleonic songstresses" (Stylus, USA)
"A sophisticated trilingual pop record, spinning twitchy electronics, American freak-folk and Brazilian traditions into a glittering tableau. All the more radiant for their partial construction, Cibelle's songs are marked by a billowing drift, with pliant, meandering melodies and progressions that seem less linear than mutational, evolving toward realization by gradual degrees" (Pitchfork, USA)
"Innovating on old-world beauty. Cibelle crafts tunes that tell stories embellished by an instrumentation that won't disappoint. Her approach to song construction reminds me of The Books and Psapp" (Aurgasm, USA)
"A delightful surprise to those who enjoy their music heady as well as luscious, and with a literate, worldly edge" (Allmusic, USA)
"She's a canny pop amalgamator, experimenting with soundscapes but never forgetting about tunes… Even when her music is most borderless and surreal, she never sounds disoriented. She navigates with a melodic grace that's purely Brazilian" (The New York Times, USA)
"A playfully trippy excursion full of unexpected twists. She infuses her songs and performances with a sense of discovery" (The Boston Globe, USA)
"She's found the recipe for delicate and tasty music which blend songwriting and cutting-edge wizardry… A rich palette of colours and heady perfumes. Gifted with sensitive and powerful antennaes, she transforms all the informations which she absorbs to create a universal language" (Les Inrockuptibles, France)
"With the delicate fingers of a fairy, she can sculpt a variety of sounds generated by lighters, plastic cups, guitars or Fender Rhodes... Inventive and sensual, she carved 14 tracks which are as many miniature worlds, which reveal more charm and details with each listen" (Elle Magazine, France)
External links
- Cibelle's myspace page
- http://crammed.be.dd5126.kasserver.com/index.php?id=34&art_id=34Cibelle on the Crammed DiscsCrammed DiscsCrammed Discs is an independent record label whose output blends world music, rock, pop, and electronica. Based in Brussels, Belgium, Crammed was founded in 1980 by Marc Hollander of Aksak Maboul and has since released over 300 albums and 250 singles, working with artists from all over the world...
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