Carles Benavent

[WillBuckingham]

Anyone catch Chick Corea on tour with Touchstone? The bass player, Carles Benavent was killer! He played a 5 string (Must've been EADGC or something like that -not low B-) with a pick. Great tone, with lots of string noise. Phenomenal performance (as one would expect) all around.

Anyone know what kind of bass he plays?

 

[Humabass]

I saw Touchstone at Blues Alley in D.C.and sat 10 ft from Carles. I've been a fan of his for years. I met him before and after the show and he let me play his bass. It's a one-off Jerzy Drozd who is a Slavic builder in Madrid. It has a super thin and narrow neck with mandolin frets and is strung with light gauge roundwounds E-highC. I'm not kidding when I tell that it couldn't have weighed more than 6 lbs! He said it also had a midi-system installed but he wasn't using it. He said he usually uses EBS amps in Europe but for this gig he was playing a rented Aguilar DB750 and Aguilar 410 cab. I've seen him before with the flamenco guitarist Paco DeLucia who he played with before. Carles,Jorge Prado (sax), and the percussionist were Paco's band for years.

 

[Brad Maestas]

Yes, I remember the first time I heard him. I'll never forget it. I got the album Touchstone the same day I got Miles live at Montreax with Quincy Jones. His sound is so unique! Some people don't like his style but I dig it even if I can't approach it. I haven't heard the recent stuff. *New albums to buy!*

 

[Humabass]

You should check out his first solo album and his albums with
Jorge Prado and Tino DiGiraldo-awesome stuff!

 

[DaveBeny]

Carles is a great musician. We discussed him on Talkbass in just the last couple of weeks: http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=204249&highlight=carles+benavent

There is a new 2CD album of Chick and the Touchstone band, 'Rhumba Flamenco', which is only available through www.chickcorea.com at the moment. As I type this post, I am a listening to an audience recording of the band at the Ann Arbor jazz fest earlier this year - Carles' playing is wonderful on this.

Chick and Touchstone played in London last year and it was a brilliant performance - the sound of the band is reminiscent of the first two Return to Forever albums ('Return to Forever' and 'Light as a Feather')

Jerzy Drozd is now offering Carles' 'Barcelona' bass as a special request model:
http://www.jerzydrozdbasses.com/carlesbenavent.htm
http://www.jerzydrozdbasses.com/barcelona.htm


Two video clips:
Link Removed (thanks again JP!)
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

 

[KJung]

Anyone catch Chick Corea on tour with Touchstone? The bass player, Carles Benavent was killer! He played a 5 string (Must've been EADGC or something like that -not low B-) with a pick. Great tone, with lots of string noise. Phenomenal performance (as one would expect) all around.

Anyone know what kind of bass he plays?

I saw the Detroit show and put up a mini review somewhere recently. It was a great show, and Carles was smoking!