Travelers who like to combine great music with sightseeing
in Brazil should take note. The 11th edition of MIMO, a free music
and film festival in Brazil, kicks off on August 29 and will take place in four
of Brazil's most beautiful and historic cities: Ouro Preto, Olinda, Paraty and
Tiradentes. Producer Lu Araújo launched MIMO in 2004 in Olinda, with the acronym standing for "Mostra Internacional da Música em Olinda." The event grew in
importance and added three more cities along the way. According to MIMO, more
than 630,000 people have attended the festival to date. This year, the scenery
will be spectacular and so will the concert lineups, featuring many notable
international and Brazilian artists.
Trilok Gurtu
In terms of music, some of the 2014 highlights are Chick
Corea and the Vigil, Lau and the James Duncan Mackenzie Band (both from
Scotland), Indian percussionist Trilok Gurtu, Mali's Bassekou Kouyate (who
plays the ngoni, a West African lute) and his band Ngoni Ba, Spanish
early-music maestro Jordi Savall, Jamaican singer Winston MacAnuff and French
accordionist Fixi and the European orchestra Chaarts.
Bongar
Pianist-guitarist Egberto Gismonti, guitarist Toninho Horta,
percussionist Naná Vasconcelos and violincello player Lui Comibra, guitarist
Marco Pereira and accordionist Toninho Ferragutti, singer-violinist Renata Rosa,
pianist Hercules Gomes, the group Bongar from Olinda, saxophonist Zé Nogueira
and vibraphonist Arthur Dutra, pianist João Donato, and samba singer-composer Diogo
Nogueira and mandolin virtuoso Hamilton Holanda (performing their "Bossa
Negra" album) are among the Brazilian performers.
Toninho Horta
In addition, the 2014 program includes 21 movies,
documentaries and short films. There are also free music-education classes and
a MIMO Instrumental Award. All events are free to the public and presented in
churches, squares and courtyards of these four cities known for their stunning
colonial and baroque architecture. The festival will run Aug. 29-31 in Ouro
Preto, Sept. 4-7 in Olinda, Oct. 10-12 in Paraty, and Oct. 17-19 in Tiradentes.
A unique Brazilian music event, the Festival Vale do Café (The Coffee Valley Festival), began on July 7 and runs until July 27 in the small towns and old coffee plantations of verdant, historic areas in and around the city of Vassouras, about two hours from Rio de Janeiro. The focus is primarily on jazz, choro, bossa nova, regional styles and classical music. Concerts are free in the public squares and churches of Vassouras and nearby cities, while tickets are required for the intimate music shows staged at stately fazendas (plantations).
Singers Fafá de Belém and Joanna will perform this year in free concerts, while the Bianca Gismonti Trio, Duo Santoro, Nicolas Krassik e os Cordestinos, Gabriel Grossi, Orquestra Carioca do Choro, Turibio Santos, Carol MacDavit, Gilson Peranzzetta, Mauro Senise, Cristina Braga, Bia Bedran and Trio Madeira Brasil will also make appearances. During the festival, many free music classes are offered for children. One night (the Cortejo de Tradições) is devoted to folia de reis, capoeira, jongo, cana-verde and other folkloric traditions, peformed by local groups. This is the 12th year of the festival, which was created by harpist Cristina Braga. Guitarist Turibio Santos and Paulo Barroso are the event's artistic directors.
The main house of an old fazenda.
Turibio Santos (guitar) and Cristina Braga (harp).
Brazil's Singers, Songwriters, and Musicians Tell the
Story of Bossa Nova, MPB, and Brazilian Jazz and Pop
by Chris McGowan
Now available in Kindle (see below)
"The Brazilian Music Book by Chris McGowan
is an involving work thanks to the insight of the author, his integrity and his deep love
for Brazilian music. It is a book destined for success and I hope to see it translated into Portuguese as soon as
possible."—Turibio Santos, classical guitarist, director of the Villa-Lobos Museum in
Rio de Janeiro and artistic director of the Vale do Café music festival.
Journalist Chris McGowan has covered Brazilian music for Billboard magazine, The Huffington Post, and his own The Brazilian Sound blog, and co-authored multiple editions of the definitive reference book on the subject—The Brazilian Sound: Samba, Bossa Nova and the Popular Music of Brazil. Along the way, he has interviewed many of the most important and influential legends of Brazilian music. In this new omnibus volume, McGowan presents many of these interviews in complete and unabridged form for the first time. There are twenty revealing conversations with iconic figures in Brazilian music, including Antonio Carlos Jobim, Carlos Lyra, Milton Nascimento, Airto Moreira, Dori Caymmi, Laurindo Almeida, Antonio Adolfo, Djavan, Ivan Lins, Gilberto Gil, Gal Costa, Cristina Braga, Luciana Souza and Lenine. A Kindle edition of The Brazilian Music Book (which can be viewed on iPad, Android, PCs and Macs) is available now; a paperback version will be available soon.
The Brazilian Sound: Samba, Bossa Nova and the Popular Music of Brazil, by Chris McGowan and Ricardo Pessanha, the leading guide to Brazilian musicians and genres in the English language, is available worldwide in paperback (cover above) and ebook (Kindle and Nook) editions (cover below).
A "landmark history of Brazilian popular music" --Rob Arcand, VICE
Links for all print and digital editions, globally available through Amazon:
Carlos Lyra will celebrate the 60th anniversary
of his career this year with concerts in several major Brazilian cities and the recording of a live DVD, both mostly likely in September. The
singer-guitarist-songwriter is one of bossa nova's key figures and most
important composers. João Gilberto recorded three of Lyra's songs—"Maria
Ninguém" (Maria Nobody), "Lobo Bobo" (Foolish Wolf) and
"Saudade Fez Um Samba" (Saudade Made a Samba*)—on Chega de Saudade (1959), generally
regarded as the first bossa nova album. Lyra was one of the first bossa artists
to release a solo album, in 1960. And he took the genre in new directions in
the early '60s, with polemical lyrics and his involvement in musical theater
productions that protested social injustice in Brazil.
Antonio Carlos Jobim praised Lyra as a "great melodist"
and "formidable composer," while Marcos Valle commented that Lyra
"was the guy who knew how to create bossa nova's most beautiful melodies.
Tom [Jobim] was fantastic, with his harmonies and everything, but the melodies
of Carlinhos were unbeatable." In the early '60s, Stan Getz, Charlie Byrd,
Zoot Sims, Cal Tjader, Herbie Mann, Quincy Jones Vince Guaraldi, Phil Woods,
Paul Winter, Lalo Schifrin, Astrud Gilberto, Sérgio Mendes and even Brigitte
Bardot recorded Lyra's songs. And Paul Winter performed "Maria Ninguém"
at the Kennedy White House in 1962.
Kay Lyra and her father Carlos perform "Você e Eu" on live TV
Despite all this, Lyra's works have had much less of a
presence in international jazz and pop recordings since the '60s, as opposed to
Jobim, whose compositions are still heavily performed and recorded. In part,
this is because Lyra fell out of favor with Brazil's military, which overthrew
a democratic government in 1964, and he went into a self-imposed exile from
1964 to 1971. This took him away from the Brazilian recording industry for a
long and crucial period in his career, and he spent most of his exile in
Mexico, hardly a launching pad for global recognition at the time. Lyra always
marched to his own drummer and never put much effort into establishing a career
in the U.S., as did Jobim and many other Brazilian musicians. "I never
pursued success, not even in Brazil," Lyra comments. "I always
pursued quality. My songs, when they were heard, were accepted and recorded by
many in the whole world, without my having to ask, do marketing or let go of my
life and my tranquility in order to run after success."
As a result of this, Lyra is still a musical hero in Brazil,
for his bossa nova classics and for being a symbol of the resistance during the
dictatorship, but his catalog of songs lies largely untouched overseas. In the
new millennium, Phil Woods and Barbara Casini have covered Lyra's "Você e
Eu" (You and I) in 2001, Luciana Souza recorded "Se É Tarde Me
Perdoa" (If It's Late, Forgive Me) in 2003, andRosa Passos interpreted "Lobo Bobo" in 2004. But such
efforts are few and far between, and the last ten years have seen an even
bigger drought. Jazz and pop artists who appreciate Brazilian music would do
well to acquaint themselves with Lyra's work, which is a somewhat undiscovered
source of bossa classics, with great melodies and rich harmonies.
Carlos Lyra and Leila Pinheiro perform "Saudade Fez Um Samba" and "Se É Tarde Me Perdoa."
Lyra was unusual for bossa nova in that he was both a
charismatic performer and an acclaimed songwriter; the other principal artists were mostly good at one or the other thing. Jazz saxophonist Paul Winter teamed with Lyra on The Sound of Ipanema album in 1965 and
recalls, "He was a little more outgoing than João [Gilberto]. I remember
many nights when Carlos just would melt the clothes off every lady in the room.
That guy had a magic that probably surpasses that of any other performer I’ve
ever known. His music was so alluring and sensual. His melodies are gorgeous,
whereas João didn’t write and Jobim didn’t perform a lot."
Lyra started his career precociously. Born in 1936 in Rio de
Janeiro, he wrote his first song "Quando Chegares" (When You Arrive)
in 1954. The next year, singer Sylvia Telles recorded Antonio Carlos Jobim and
Newton Mendonça's "Foi a Noite" (It Was the Night); the other side of
the single was the young Lyra's composition "Menina" (Girl). Around
this time, he began frequenting the Plaza Bar in the Hotel Plaza in Leme, a
neighborhood adjacent to Copacabana. It was a formative site for the creators
of bossa nova, a place for the likes of Johnny Alf, Jobim, Gilberto, João
Donato, Baden Powell, Sylvia Telles, and Dolores Duran to share musical ideas.
Jobim, Vinícius, Bôscoli, Menescal and Lyra
In 1956, Lyra opened a guitar academy with high school buddy
Roberto Menescal, who would become another major figure in bossa nova. One of
their students was a young Nara Leão, whose parent's Copacabana apartment
became a favorite spot for jam sessions and who later became one of bossa's
most renowned singers. By the next year, singer-guitarist João Gilberto had introduced
the bossa nova beat to his musician friends, distilling samba rhythms into a
simpler and irresistible pattern and acting as a catalyst for much great
songwriting to come. Lyra, though, remembers Gilberto as having
introduced his new beat at an earlier date, and doesn't give it as much importance
as others do, seeing it as part of bossa's repertoire rather than its essential
rhythm.
The new style of music made its public debut with Lyra and
others before some two hundred people at Rio's Clube Hebráica (Hebrew Club) in
1957. Either the club's events director or an anonymous secretary billed the
night's offerings as "Today, Sylvia Telles, Carlos Lyra and the bossa nova
group." From that point on, "bossa nova" became accepted as a
label for the new style. Odeon released Gilberto's recordings of "Chega de
Saudade" and "Desafinado" in 1958, and the album Chega de Saudade in 1959, the latter produced
by Jobim and including three Lyra songs as well as three Jobim tunes in the mix.
But Lyra became fed up with the Odeon label's delay
in recording him and others and signed with Philips, for which he recorded his
first album Bossa Nova in 1959,
released in May 1960. This created a small rupture in bossa nova, with some
musicians staying with Odeon, which had been nurturing them for some time and
making promises, and others going to Philips.
Also in 1960, Lyra began his collaborations with poet and
lyricist Vinícius de Moraes, who replaced Ronaldo Bôscoli as his main
songwriting partner. Vinícius was the genre's most important lyricist and
Jobim's frequent collaborator, and wrote the words for "Garota de Ipanema."
Philips released Lyra's second album Carlos
Lyra in 1961, and the next year he appeared on Bossa Nova Mesmo with Sylvia Telles, Vinícius and Oscar
Castro-Neves, and Bossa Nova at Carnegie
Hall, the live recording of the historic concert that introduced many of
bossa's main figures to an American audience.
In front: Carlos Lyra, Nara Leão and Vinícius de Moraes
By 1961, with bossa nova booming in Brazil, Lyra had already
begun to take his art in a new direction, co-founding the leftist CPC (The People's
Center for Culture) of the UNE (National Student's Union), which sought to
create revolutionary popular art and popular art forms to take the masses out
of "alienation and submission." The
CPC also sought to facilitate interchanges between the culture of the povo
(the "people," i.e., the poor and working class) and the middle class. At this time, Lyra had begun to
feel that bossa nova needed socially conscious lyrics and that, as he would
later say, it had "a hell of a lot of form, but lacked content."
He and Vinícius wrote the musical Pobre Menina
Rica (Poor Little Rich Girl) in 1962. It had politically conscious
lyrics, such as those of the electrifying "Maria Moita," which
manages in just a few words to be both a protest against social inequality and
an early feminist anthem. Pobre Menina
Rica was released as an album in '64, staged in France
that year, and translated into Spanish by novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
A young Antonio Adolfo participated as a pianist in the
musical. "It was a privilege
having Carlos Lyra invite me and my Trio 3D to participate in the wonderful and
magical play by him and Vinícius. He was the one who baptized my trio. We
worked on Pobre Menina Rica for three
or four months from December 1963 through March 1964, at the Teatro de Bolso in
Ipanema. Jobim always mentioned, 'Carlos Lyra was the finest melodist of bossa
nova' and I agree completely. His songs are so inspired, and the combination of
melody and harmony is really something. Later, during the '90s, when I worked
with him again as arranger and producer of his Bossa Lyra album, I had the chance to go deeper into his songs and become more and more passionate for his music. He is one of the greatest composers of all time."
Vinícius de Moraes and Carlos Lyra
Also in 1963, another of Lyra's new songs was the polemical "Canção do Subdesenvolvido" (Song of the Underdeveloped) about economic exploitation, written with Chico de Assis; it was censored the next
year. Lyra was the musical director of Teatro de Arena, which staged controversial productions. One of their most famous shows was Opinião, directed by Augusto Boal, which protested Brazil's poverty and social problems and in which Lyra played an important role.
While working on a film soundtrack, Lyra had visited Mangueira, a poor neighborhood that is home to a venerable samba school of the same name, and gotten to know Cartola, who introduced him to fellow samba composers Nelson Cavaquinho, Zé Keti and Elton Medeiros. They met often at the apartment of Lyra, who sought to introduce their music to a wider public. He introduced them to bossa singer Nara Leão, who would record their songs on her 1964 album Nara; one of the tunes was Keti's "Diz Que Fui Por Ai," which became a hit. Later, Leão, Keti and northeastern composer João do Vale starred in the
politically charged musical Opinião, which debuted in December and was a big success. Lyra contributed two songs, "Lamento de Um Homem Só (Song of a Man Alone) and "Marcha da Quarta-Feira de Cinzas" (Ash Wednesday March) and was present in the early rehearsals of the show, a precursor of the MPB (eclectic post-bossa Brazilian popular music) to come with its mixing of bossa, samba and regional music.
While Lyra wanted to take bossa nova in a different direction, he also surprised some CPC colleagues by unashamedly stating that he was part of the bourgeoisie and that he created bourgeois, not popular, culture. He was always true to himself and wouldn't let others sway him. When Lyra appeared
in one of the first televised bossa performances, on TV Excelsior in São Paulo,
he was told backstage beforehand that he would be offered some Mentex chewing
gum (Mentex was one of the show's sponsors) and should say, "Thank you. I
love Mentex." He refused, replying that he wouldn't plug their product or anyone
else's for free. The show's representatives didn't give up and tried to force
the issue. During the performance, a girl dressed as a bunny approached him and
asked if he'd like some Mentex. "No, I hate it," he replied on live
television.
The Sound of Ipanema (1965) with Paul Winter (left) and Carlos Lyra (right)
In 1964, he recorded the The
Sound of Ipanema with Paul Winter (released in '65) and appeared
at the Newport Jazz Festival with Stan Getz. His career was flourishing, but
the military had overthrown Brazil's democratically elected government on March
31 of that year. Lyra knew his days there were numbered, as sooner or later the
government would come after him. He left Brazil, came back, and left again,
this time for seven years. While he was gone, he toured with Getz in 1965 and
'66, and decided to relocate to Mexico, where he lived for five years. While there, he married the American
actress-model Katherine Lee Riddell (now Kate Lyra); their daughter Kay is now a
singer.
After he returned to Brazil for good, he still had to tread carefully. His
album Herói de Medo (Fear's Hero),
recorded in 1974, was initially censored entirely. He left to live in Los
Angeles for two years, where he took Arthur Janov's "primal scream" therapy
(there, he met John Lennon, a fellow participant) and studied astrology. Since
his return to Brazil in 1976, he has performed often, but recorded relatively few works,
with the exception of the retrospectives Bossa
Lyra (1993) and Sambalanço (2000); Carioca de Algema (Carioca in Handcuffs), a 1994 album of
original songs; and group efforts like Vivendo
Vinícius Ao Vivo (1998), with Baden Powell, Miúcha, Toquinho, and Os Bossa Nova (2008) withRoberto Menescal, Marcos Valle and João
Donato.
Leo Gandelman (sax) and Charlie Hunter (guitar) improvise to "Quem Quiser Encontrar o Amor."
Some of his other well known compositions not mentioned
above include: "Aruanda," "Minha Namorada" (My Girlfriend),
"A Certain Sadness," "Influência de Jazz," "Coisa Mais
Linda" (The Most Beautiful Thing), "Quem Quiser Encontrar O
Amor" (Who Wants to Find Love), "Samba do Carioca"
and "Primavera" (Spring). The retrospective DVD Carlos Lyra: 50 Anos da Música (2005) is an excellent introduction
to his work; Lyra performs 27 of his best known songs with guests such as Leila
Pinheiro, Antonio Adolfo, Roberto Menescal, Marcos Valle, João Donato, Wanda Sá
and his daughter Kay Lyra.
______
*saudade = missing someone or something.
references:
-Much of the background information is from a 2013 interview with Carlos Lyra by Chris McGowan (for The Brazilian Music Book).
-Jobim quote from Carlos Lyra Songbook (Rio de Janeiro: Editora Lumiar, 1994).
-Marcos Valle quoted in the DVD Carlos Lyra: 50 Anos de Música (Biscoito
Fino, 2005).
-According to Paul Winter, interviewed by Chris McGowan in 2014.
-Mentex story from from Magda Botafogo, Carlos Lyra's agent and manager.
In May of 2013 I was interviewed about Jorge Benjor's song
"Mas Que Nada" by the Japanese television show Song to Soul*, which airs on the BS TBS channel in that country.
Each hour-long program profiles a particular song that has achieved status as a
classic in Japan. In this case, the show focused on the recording of "Mas
Que Nada" by Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66, which projected the song
globally.
"Mas Que Nada" (Oh, Come On) is a composition that
left an indelible cultural mark in many countries, and has become one of the
most played Brazilian songs of all time worldwide. Dizzy Gillespie,
Oscar Peterson, Al Jarreau, Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba, Trini Lopez, Al Hirt, Ella
Fitzgerald and many notable Brazilian artists are among the few hundred musicians who have recorded it. In recent years, it has been the most played song in North America sung entirely in Portuguese, and the Sergio Mendes version was the only all-Portuguese recording to have been a pop hit in the U.S., other than Carmen Miranda's "Mamãe Eu Quero."
Jorge Benjor (Jorge Duílio Lima Meneses) first recorded the song fifty years ago in 1963,
after introducing it to enthusiastic bossa nova and jazz audiences at Bottles
Bar, in the famed Beco das Garrafas lane of nightclubs in Copacabana. One of those who heard Benjor (then going by the name of Ben) playing there with the Copa Cinco group was a Philips executive and the young singer-songwriter-guitarist was soon signed to a contract. Benjor released "Mas Que Nada," a kinetic samba with hints of maracatu,
on his album Samba Esquema Novo for the Philips label. Just prior to that, the song was recorded by the Zé
Maria group (with Jorge supplying vocals) for its Tudo Azul album and by the Tamba Trio on Avanço.
The song had Benjor's unique groove, and didn't fit into the
realms of either traditional samba or bossa nova. "Mas Que Nada" was
a hit and helped launch Benjor's career in Brazil. It achieved iconic status
outside of Brazil thanks to the 1966 album Sergio
Mendes & Brazil '66, which incorrectly lists the tune as "Mais Que
Nada." Mendes had been tinkering with his group and repertoire, trying to
find the right combination to achieve success in the U.S. And on this album,
recorded for A&M Records, he found it. It featured a light, upbeat blend of
Brazilian music and American pop, and Lani Hall's double-tracked vocals (she later
sang in unison with Janice Hansen, who joined the group after this recording
was finished). The album reached no. 7 on the U.S. pop charts, with a big push from
its lead song, "Mas Que Nada."
Mendes's infectious version of "Mas Que Nada" was
more celebratory than Benjor's own (which had been arranged by J.T. Meirelles)
and closer in spirit to the organ/percussion-heavy Zé Maria recording, with Sergio's driving, jazzy
piano and Lani Hall's soaring chorus. While "Mas Que Nada" was only a minor hit, reaching no.
47 on the Billboard pop singles chart,
it caught the ears of many other musicians and has stayed in the public
consciousness to this day. Sergio recorded it again in 2006, a hip-hop-charged
version with the Black Eyed Peas, for the album Timeless. The new version hit no. 1 in Brazil, Holland and Hungary,
no. 13 on the U.S. Billboard Hot
Dance Club Play chart, and no. 6 on the U.K. singles chart. The version was
included in EA's 2006 FIFA World Cup and NBA Live '07 video games, and in a
Nike ad with soccer players from the Brazilian national team. Mendes recorded
it again with his wife, singer Gracinha Leporace, for the 2011 animated film Rio.
Starting with "Mas Que Nada" and Samba Esquema Novo, Jorge Benjor carved
out a unique musical identity for himself, fusing elements of samba, bossa
nova, rock, and funk, not fitting into any one category. He knocked down cultural walls just by being himself, and was able to move freely between different musical factions -- whether it was the bossa nova crowd, the Jovem Guarda pop stars, or various MPB artists. "Pais Tropical," "Fio Maravilha," "Chove Chuva," and "Taj Mahal" are among his other many oft-recorded standards. The Jorge Benjor
"swing" has influenced generations of Brazilian musicians, including contemporary romantic pagode samba artists, and is
still fresh after all these years, as is "Mas Que Nada."
Here is Jorge Benjor's own 1963 recording of the song:
Sergio Mendes's 1966 version:
And the 2006 Sergio Mendes and Black Eyes Peas recording of "Mas Que Nada":
--Chris McGowan
*There is information in Japanese about the July, 2013 "Mas Que Nada" edition of Song to Soul here: http://www.bs-tbs.co.jp/songtosoul/onair/onair_74.html.
Accordionist-composer Dominguinhos, one of the musical greats from Brazil's Northeast, passed away on July 23rd. His accordion playing on his many solo albums and works by Luiz Gonzaga, Gilberto Gil, Elba Ramalho and many others is an indelible part of Brazil's musical history. Born on February 12, 1941 in Garanhuns, in the interior of Pernambuco, Dominguinhos started learning to play the accordion at age six, met and impressed the legendary Luiz Gonzaga at nine, and moved to Rio at 13 to pursue a musical career, where he re-connected with Gonzaga and became part of his band. He was a master of the regional forró, xote and baião styles, and also delved into bossa nova, jazz and pop. He went on to tour and record with Gonzaga, and worked with many important figures of MPB (also including Martia Bethânia. Toquinho, Nana Caymmi, Sivuca and Yamandú Costa), being called upon "when the perfect accordion touch was required," as noted in The Brazilian Sound. He recorded more than forty solo albums and as a songwriter teamed with Anastácia, Nando Cordel, Gilberto Gil, Djavan, Chico Buarque and others. He contributed numerous Northeastern-flavored classics such as "Só Quero Um Xodo" and "Lamento Sertanejo." He was considered a fine person and will be sorely missed. He was much beloved in Brazil's musical community: here are some testimonials to Dominguinhos (in Portuguese). Here are two of his most well-known compositions:
Dominguinhos, "So Quero Um Xodó"
Dominguinhos and Gilberto Gil, "Lamento Sertanejo"
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