Estradas

In 2023, on an absolutely sweltering summer night in Ortigia, Sicily (as the rest of the island went up in flames), Italian Drummer-composer and multi-instrumentalist Valentina Valentina Magaletti and Afro-Portuguese artist Nídia took to the stage to perform the results of the artistic residency they had just taken part in. Their show was an explosion of acoustic, wiry drumming, heavy duty electronics, and blaring synths which left the audience asking: “When will we be hearing more of this?” Thankfully, it didn’t take the duo long to cook their quickfire collaborations from that week together into a whole album. Estradas brings together Nídia’s innovative batida beats and Magaletti’s intricate percussion, exploring the balance between the programmed precision with more organic, looser drumming. The collision of human and mechanical is electrifying, harnessing all the dancefloor energy of kuduro and the trippier atmospheres typical of the Italian drummer’s style. Yet despite their completely different background, approaches, and styles, one of the remarkable things about this record is just how the boundaries between who is doing what blur almost completely, creating a creative synergy so deep that it’s hard to tell where one artist’s contribution ends and the other’s begins.