RAFAEL ESCOTÉ - Bass
Gòtic: Adventures and illusions
Question: What does a boy at seventeen, working from 09: 00h to 17: 00h, selling ice cream, frozen, ultra-frozen, yoghourt and cheese for a multi-national, when the workday ends?
Answer: Run away !! Take the bus across town and meet some "deluded" friends like him and try to play some instruments and spend the remainder of the day making noise in the best possible way .
If it turns out to coincide, as is the case, with some colleagues who admire and respect the music, the seed of a “band” soon begins to bear fruit.
The meeting, since the schooldays, with Jordi Martí and Jordi Vilaprinyó was in my case, the way to discover that music was much more than the summer songs of the 70s!! It was a way of playing, with more or less success, the music that we liked best from the music scene in those years ... Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Yes, The Premiata Forneria Marconi ...
After copying "blatantly" for a long time, we began to create our own songs and soon after, with Jep Nuix at the flute, the group produced truly original music.
Rafa Escoté
(bass)
Rafa: Mini bio
In 1975 forms the symphonic rock group Gòtic that quickly becomes one of the most significant bands in the musical trends at the moment in Barcelona. The group recorded only one album "Escenes" (Scenes)
.
At the same time he starts working as a sideman for some of the most popular folk and pop singers in the movement know as "Nova Cançó". People as Joan Isaac, Sisa, Ramon Muntaner, Joan Baptiste Humet etc... got some innovative bass lines recorded in their own works.
Rafael joins the staff of the music school "Escola de Música de Vallvidrera" as the main electric bass teacher. In 1981 he founds with pianist Lluís Vidal the jazz quartet “Catalonia” recruiting Angel Pereira as drummer & vibes and Antonio Peral on saxes. The group recorded an album entitled "Catalonia" (Cúspide label - 1981). Rafa also joined the jazz big band Factoría Musical (1981-82)
From 1980 to 1985 Rafa played as session bassist for a lot of artists and major record labels in the recording facilities of Barcelona and Madrid.
Rafa also got the main chair as electric bass and music theory teacher at the (Berklee endorsed) Aula de Música Moderna i Jazz de Barcelona. He did a lot of gigs with some of the most innovative groups of the moment: Tribu (of drummer Santi Arisa), Max Sunyer Trio, Joan Sanmartí's Trio al Blanco etc.
In 1982 Rafael co-founded the fusion rock group Pegasus with Josep Mas "Kitflus" on keyboards, Max Sunyer on guitars and Santi Arisa on drums.
The band performed all around Spain, at the Montreux Jazz Festival, at the New York Kool Jazz Festival, at the Miami International Film Festival and spanish Jazz Festivals in Madrid, Barcelona, San Sebastián, Bilbao etc...
The group celebrated its 25 years of existence in 2008 with a concert DVD recorded at the Auditorium of Barcelona, as part of the jazz festival in the city. Visit the Pegasus site to get updated on recent activities of the group!
Pegasus has ten records published as of 2015 and is still very active.
In 1989 he records his first solo album Aldebarán with good friends like Santi Arisa, Lluís Vidal, Manel Camp, Josep Mas "Kitflus" amongst others. The record won the award of radio station Radio 4 as the best catalan recording of the year in the playing quality category.
During 1990 he works for Apple Computers (Spain) as music consultant.
He was also co-founder and teacher at the Computing & Music Center (Centre d'Informàtica Musical de l'Aula de Música). In 1991 the music school Taller de Músics of Barcelona invites Rafael to prepare the material for their starting department of New Technologies.
In 2002 Rafa and Josep Mas "Kitflus" formed KitflusKuartet with drummer Roger Blàvia and cellist Manuel Martínez del Fresno. The band recorded one CD released 2004 on Satchmo Jazz Records spanish label and re-released 2005 by New Mood Jazz label.