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Artist
Rufus Cappadocia
11+ albums
cellojazzCanadian
about
A native of Hamilton, Ontario, Cappadocia picked up his first cello at the age of three, but to call him a prodigy is to miss the point. “I’ve always had a problematic relationship with my instrument,” he muses. “It’s been the essential means of expression for me, but the standard career paths it can lead you down leave a lot to be desired.” Cappadocia realized early on that the strictures of classical music couldn’t come close to capturing the soaring sounds he heard in his head. “The first time I ever heard a walking bass line, something stirred deep inside. When I heard B.B. King’s ‘The Thrill Is Gone’ for the first time, I actually wept. It was like suddenly discovering that I hadn’t been alone all that time.” Cappadocia moved to Montreal to attend McGill University, where he spent hours in its library’s ethno-musicology department, discovering everything from the Pygmy chants of the West African rain forest to vintage Bulgarian folk recordings. “It was a tremendously productive time,” he enthuses. “I was learning Hendrix and Coltrane riffs note-for-note. I got deeply in the city’s progressive jazz scene and developed and built a solid-body five string electric cello, so I could hold my own with other electric instruments. Eventually I’d hook it up to a battery and play on the streets and in the subway stations.” Leaving school, Cappadocia relocated to Europe, where his busking landed him in Southern France and, eventually, Spain, where he was first exposed to the mix
