JAZZ ESTÁ MORTO 2019
Last month, Adrian Younge, Ali Shaheed Muhammad and ArtDontSleep took a journey to Brazil. Adrian and Ali were performing The Midnight Hour and we (ADS) were tour managing. Long story short, we paid our respects to the Brazilian Maestros, whose musical shoulders we stand on. We sat in the homes of Arthur Verocai and Azymuti. We broke bread with João Donato and Marcos Valle. To believe that those humble meetings have turned into this epic series is a dream come true. Join us, for one, if not all, of our special events.
AZYMUTH was born out of the bossa nova and jazz scenes in Rio de Janeiro in the 1960’s. Keyboard player and bandleader Jose Roberto Bertrami (RIP), drummer Ivan ‘Mamao’ Conti and bass player Alex Malheiros met during that time and recorded an album called ‘O Trio’ in 1968 under the name ‘Projeto 3’. ‘Projeto 3’ changed their name to ‘Azimuth’ after backing the recording of ‘O Fabuloso Fittipaldi’ for Marcos Valle in the early ’70’s – ‘AZYMUTH’ is a track title from that album. Their first recording under the new name was a four-track EP for Polydor in 1975. This was followed by their first full-length self-titled LP for Som Livre also in 1975. ‘Agua Nao Come Mosca’ came in 1977 and was also released outside Brazil – in the USA and Japan – by Atlantic Records. In 1979 they released ‘Light As A Feather’ for legendary US jazz label Milestone – it became one of the best-selling records of the year and features the all-time classic disco/fusion dancer ‘Jazz Carnival’. This isn’t our first time bringing the trio to Los Angeles. Back in ’08 we co presented an event with mochilla, with the generous contribution of Spaceland and VTech, we brought them to the Echoplex and in 09’ we copresented and produced Arthur Verocai’s “Timeless” concert (with mochilla) and brought AZYMUTH as part of the rhythm section. This time, we bring them back without Bertrami (RIP), but very much in tact.
João Donato might be best known in record-head circles for his brilliant jazz-funk album Quem é Quem, but he’s an absolute living legend and an icon of Brazilian music. He’s also recorded and released albums on American labels and has had his songs performed and/or played with folks like Ron Carter, Ray Barretto, Astrid Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Cal Tjader, Tito Puente, Eddie Palmieri, Mongo Santamaria, Stanley Clark, Herbie Mann, Jack McDuff, the Village Callers and others.
Arthur Verocai began his professional music career in 1969 as music director and guitar player for the show ‘É a maior.’ That same year he wrote orchestra arrangements which were presented in the music festivals of Porto Alegre and Sao Paulo for the first time. Over the next few years he was responsible for the orchestration of albums by Ivan Lins, Jorge Ben, Elizeth Cardoso, Gal Costa, Quarteto em Cy, MPB 4 and Marcos Valle among others.
In the 1970s he was hired by Brazil’s biggest TV station TV Globo as musical director where he wrote the arrangements for many of the stations biggest shows.
Following his success Arthur had with the production of Ivan Lins 1971 album Agora Arthur recorded his self-titled debut album on Continental Records. A forbidding Brazilian military dictatorship frowned on artistic impression that repressed the youth of the country. He challenged the musical conventions of the day combining Brazilian influences with folksy soul and lo-fi electronic experimentations of American artists like Shuggie Otis or the orchestration of producer Charles Stepney. His subtle protest experimented with new musical directions and used figurative language to sneak under the censorship radar..
Today this album is a cult and has been sampled by many US producers, singers and artists. The idea of mixing strings with contemporary sounds came from my desire of searching for new paths.
Back in 2009, we brought (with Mochilla) Arthur Verocai’s record to life again, with the help of a lot of friends. After the concert that night, Cut Chemist declared, “that was one of the best shows L.A. has ever seen.”
Marcos Valle straddled North and South America for over twenty years taking part in some of the most important recordings by artists including Sarah Vaughan, Frank Sinatra, Tom Jobim, Sergio Mendes, Leon Ware, Chicago and Airto Moreira. In 1963 at the tender age of twenty Marcos managed to record over a dozen albums in Brazil debuting with ‘Samba Demais’. Overnight Marcos was a success. His biggest success in Brazil was to come with the album ‘Viola Enluarada’ which cemented his position as a major recording artist in Brazil and one of the most important innovators of the Bossa Nova genre.
After touring the States with Sergio Mendes band there was a growing interest in his songs from several American artists. He received many invitations to record in the States and to appear on national television. The boy from Ipanema was suddenly the star of the Andy Williams Show coast to coast across the States. Probably his biggest triumph was for entering the Guinness Book of Records as the only artist to have a track in the Billboard Top Forty with three different versions of the same song at the same time including a version by Frank Sinatra. The song Samba de Verao became a bossa nova standard.
Determined to keep in touch with his roots Marcos returned to Brazil in 1968 to work with Milton Nascimento on his own television show which helped to launch Milton’s career. He also continued to record the seminal series of albums on EMI always adapting his songwriting and production style which twenty years on were rediscovered on dance floors of Europe. In the late 70s Marcos continued to work in the US and started long-standing partnerships with Leon Ware and Chicago and performed with major artists like Sarah Vaughan. The partnership with Leon Ware was very profitable and they worked closely together on Leon’s album ‘Rocking You Eternally’ and his self titled LP.” We have ben trying to bring Marcos to Los Angeles for over a decade now. The wait is up and the time is here!
