Simone Baron & Arco Belo bring their circus-adjacent genre-fluid chamber jazz to The Fruit, weaving projections, surreal storytelling, and new original compositions into an immersive performance blurring lines between concert and dreamscape.

ARCO BELO is a group of high-energy improvisers dedicated to redefining the concert form. Drawing its name from the words bow and bellow, the ensemble captures an irreverent sound melding reeds, strings, and percussive timbres. Led by pianist, accordionist, and composer Simone Baron, their adventurous compositions reimagine a sound at the junction of avant-garde chamber music, creative jazz, Brazilian music, and diasporic music. Together, they skip effortlessly from long-form neo-baroque string counterpoint to sludgy hip-hop pads. Post-romantic cadenzas collide in moments of spontaneous noise with reedy prepared piano; guttural bow noises and cascading plectrum bring color to plush hypnotic grooves and sharply angled linear phrases.

Since 2016, the ensemble has performed for audiences across the US, including at the Kennedy Center, Strathmore, and Brevard Music Center. Arco Belo has toured the West Coast and Southeast to critical acclaim, and won grants from South Arts / Jazz Roads, the Maryland State Arts Council and Chamber Music America’s inaugural Performance Plus grant. Their debut album, The Space Between Disguises was released in November 2019 and lauded as editor’s pick in both Downbeat and JazzTimes magazines.

Shapestude - preview track from our new album

Never meet your heroes (feat Christylez Bacon), live from CapitalBop

Days of Sky (feat Christylez Bacon) , live from Boulanger Institute WoCo Fest

This performance is made possible with the support of Jazz Road, a national initiative of South Arts, which is funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation with additional support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.