“Fil Uno is trans, a mutant, a prosthetic device, a third-world cyborg” Efraín Rozas, Radio Filarmonía
“I’m glad to see there’s someone with such a sharp sense of destruction in his head, I’m glad to know Charly is not alone”
Mario Breuer, Charly García’s sound engineer
FIL UNO
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Cellist, composer, orchestra conductor and performer, Fil Uno (Lima, 1982) decided to delve as a solo artist into an exploration, both technical and intuitive, of the cello’s possibilities. The results of this research are captured in the album Violonchelo Solo (2016).
Fil Uno has collaborated with prominent experimental artists, as well as with classical and popular musicians. He has played important stages in France, Austria, Poland, Mexico and Peru. Fil Uno creates, conducts and produces baroque, popular and avant-garde shows. Either fronting orchestras, choirs or chamber ensembles, or performing as a solo artist, the common thread in his shows is his untiring quest for captivating projects, both stylistically and emotionally.
He is the director of Sensualtrip, a record label and laboratory from which he unfurls his eclectic artistic production. Among his projects is his remarkable duo with pianist Flor Canelo, with whom he composed the music to the documentary Calvo de Araujo, La Selva Misma and performed in several Peruvian cities. On the opposite side of the spectre is his electronic music duo with Frank Cebreros, La FF, in which performance plays an important role, and which aims at disrupting and breaking conventions.
He composed and conducted the sound installation for choir and orchestra for the exhibition Indios Antropófagos, by artist Christian Bendayán, commissioned for the 58th edition of the Venice Art Biennale (2019).
His versatility as a performer has led him to appear playing his music in the film Lima Grita, which won the DocTv Latinoamérica grant. He also appears playing the cello in the film Canción Sin Nombre, which premiered in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.
He has performed Violonchelo Solo in major Peruvian contemporary art galleries and museums, such as MALI, MAC, LUM, MATE, AMIL, Qorikancha Museum, Revolver Galería and Fugaz, and at the Peruvian Ministry of Culture.
Violonchelo Solo (2013-2016) is Fil Uno’s first solo album. Its six pieces explore the cello’s acoustic range, from the simple, potent standpoint of resonance. Different emotional landscapes and a monotone aesthetics –at times evoking a synthesizer– compose the author’s intimate, modernist proposal. The Violonchelo Solo performance, presented as a suite, exerts a hypnotic effect on the spectator, blurring the lines between musical genres.
Violonchelo Solo was recorded in magnetic tape by Frank Cebreros, mastered by Mario Breuer and released as a compact disc in a limited edition of 120 numbered copies. The design – an engraved matte acrylic case, silkscreened on the inside, with a raised cylinder in glossy acrylic – was created by Youth Experimental Studio. Violonchelo Solo was presented on December 11, 2016, at Revolver Galería, Lima.
THE CD
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“The record Violonchelo Solo, which I had the pleasure of hearing live, had now been transformed into this black, eerie object, which seemed capable of beaming sound without the need of a listening device.”
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Alejandra Nieto. “Fil Uno, The Atypical Cello”. Cosas magazine, 2016.
REVERBERATIONS IN THE CONTEMPORARY SCENE
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Violonchelo Solo has scored the installation There Was a Bad Tree (based on John Giorno’s homonymous poem) by Chilean artist Rodrigo Gómez, at Proyecto AMIL Gallery (Lima, Peru).
It has soundtracked the installation Impermanencia, by photographer Carolina Cardich, at the photography festival La Nuit de l’Instant (Marseille, France).
It has scored a video-art piece by José Vera Matos as part of his exhibition Profecía es Memoria, at 80m2 (Lima, Peru).
Its music has been used in the short films SED, Volver,Martín, Nora de Izcue, Madre del Cine Peruano and Sinfonía P.I.X.A. The latter two won the national experimental short film prize (Peru).
It has scored the video-art pieces Poderes Ocultos and Transmisiones, by Jorge Luis Chamorro.
The visual recording of the Violonchelo Solo concert, by KINO-A, is part of the film Lima Grita, which won the DocTv Latinoamérica grant. Documentarist Delia Ackermann filmed the amplified concert in its entirety.
The record has two music videos, “Tormenta de Plata”, by renowned filmmaker Inti Briones, and “Islas Ballena”, filmed by Adrián Portugal.
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Its music has been used in the exhibition film "Swim Hunt Run", realized in UK andUSA by Camille Sumers-Valli.2020
FIL UNO LIVE PERFORMANCES
