Sofia Carrasco's "Alma Escondida" a soundtrack of evolving jazz/introspection

NJCU jazz performance grad's album is top tier

Sofia Carrasco, saxophonist and music teacher, dropped album “Alma Escondida” on Bandcamp; the album includes Carrasco’s drawings that explore the idea of “Hidden Soul.” (Photo y Ricky Alarcón)

By D. Menzies

A few months ago, Sofia Carrasco dropped an album via Bandcamp I played not expecting my ears to stay glued through its roughly 45-minute runtime. But with “Alma Escondida,” or “Hidden Soul,” the saxophonist crafts an album that’s lively in a way that made it hard for my mind to wander; there’s no transitional or structural “lulls” (to use my own layman term) that weren’t engaging on some level, and if my mind did wander, “Alma Escondida” is a very good soundtrack for that — the experience of life in an urban place, trying to ride the peaks and valleys of a sound- and landscape someone may not have much control over, from outside their homes or inside.

On “Alma Escondida” Carrasco and company explore dance as less group social activity and more one person’s inward journey. As Carrasco preps for the album to make its way to Spotify soon, she talked to Chilltown Blues about how it came together.

“I started playing saxophone when I was 15 in Arequipa, a city in southern Peru where jazz isn’t very present,” Carrasco said. “My high school had a big band where I learned to play in an ensemble and became comfortable reading music. After high school the only option to study music formally in Arequipa was classical saxophone, so I pursued that alongside visual arts, graduating in 2018. Studying classical saxophone was key in building my technique and developing sound. Around that time, I also played in a saxophone quartet that specialized in traditional Peruvian music, which helped me become more familiar with the rhythms and sounds of Peru.”

In 2020, Carrasco became interested in a central Peruvian — “from Jauja (Junín),” she said — style of music called tunantada.