Both from Spain։ Lucky Guri, legend of Catalan jazz, dies at 73․ Emili Baleriola, historic guitarist of Máquina!, Sisa and the Plateria Orchestra, dies at 71: Videos, Photos

It was called Joaquim Guri, but everyone knew him as Lucky Guri. Luck, in this case, belonged to those who saw him in action. Disciple of Tete Montoliu, admirer of Chick Corea and responsible for projects as daring as ‘We Are Digging The Beatles’, instrumental album in which he reinterpreted the music of the Liverpool quartet together with saxophonist Peter Roar, the Barcelona musician breathed jazz on all four sides.

So much so that, after suffering a stroke in 2004, he did not stop until he relearned to play the piano. “I didn’t even know what he called me, or what the white and black keys were for,” she said then. Before that, they had helped him, among other things, lead the New Jazz Trio, become strong in the Cova de Drac, debut at the Palau de la Música playing the electric piano, found Barcelona Traction, and accompany Guillermina Mota , Maria del Mar Bonet and Núria Feliu. «When I have a good time is when all the piano», he liked to say.

The musician, jazz legend and television icon of the nineties, has died this Friday at the age of 73, according to what TV3 has advanced, a channel in which he forged his cathodic reputation as a pianist on programs such as ‘Tres pics i repicó’ or ‘Sense title’ of Andreu Buenafuente. Guri had already taken his first steps on Radio Barcelona accompanied by Mario Beut, but it was television that ended up triggering his popularity. “It was going very well for me, since that’s how I got bowling,” he relativized.
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Born in Caella in 1950, when he was barely seven years old he moved with his family to Barcelona, ​​where he studied piano and music theory at the Municipal Conservatory. Jazz, yes, he had to learn it on his own. «At that time there was only classical music, you couldn’t study jazz. I had a good ear, and from listening to the musicians that interested me I was learning, “he explained. It was not bad at all: in 1967 he formed in New Jazz Trio, in 1972 he began performing at the Cova del Drac and in 1975 he was part of Canet Rock as part of Barcelona Traction.

«Many American jazz musicians came to Cova del Drac and there was also Tete Montoliu, whom I consider my teacher. He went to many Tete concerts and there he learned a lot, and later at the Cova he sometimes replaced him. Despite being my teacher, Tete and I have very different ways of playing the piano. Tete played jazz, period. While I was very open to music that was made everywhere », he explained in an interview when recalling his formative years.

Although he always wanted to be a musician, he studied Law on a family recommendation. Meanwhile, he soaked up all the music that surrounded him and together with Joan Albert Amargós and Carles Benavent, among others, he was part of Urban music, supergroup of the ‘onda layetana’ that collected and multiplied the spirit of formations like Máquina! and Crack.

The guitarist Emili Baleriola, one of the benchmarks of the seventies progressive scene in Barcelona and one of the most respected jazz musicians in Catalonia, has died at the age of 71, as confirmed by one of his best friends, Jorge Flaco Barral.

Baleriola was part of one of the country’s most legendary jazz-rock groups, Máquina!, which would also have a great influence on this style in Europe thanks to the album “Why?”, when he was not yet in the group. With a more ambitious formation he participated in the group’s only live album, when he was an official member of the band, with which he also recorded two “singles” in English.

Baleriola was in a lot of bands and tried pretty much every style. In 1976 Jaume Sisa called him to be part of the group that recorded “La Catedral” and in 1977 he toured with the legendary musician’s group while he was part of another reference name in Barcelona, Orquestra Plateria. The guitarist also joined the Jordi Batiste Band for a few years, with which he made his debut at Zeleste, the venue he had opened in 1973 on Carrer Argenteria to program the concerts of the groups that emerged from the Ona Laietana, in which Baleriola he felt fully identified since his debut with the Crac group. The group also performed at the massive Canet Rock in 1977.

With Orquestra Plateria he participated in the recording of the first four albums and took part in the most crowded tours of the band in those years. In 1982 he left the group and after a trip to New York focused more on jazz. Returning to Catalonia, he made his music debut for television in Tortell Poltrona’s project for TV3. In the eighties he set up his own studios in Montseny. He never stopped going in and out of different groups, performing live, participating in the training of new musicians and touring with friends and different bands, mostly focused on jazz but also blues. He participated in the farewell tour of La Plateria in 2014.