Studio Masters

João Gilberto – The Legend Of Joao Gilberto 1957-61 (2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:15:50 minutes | 906 MB | Genre: Bossa Nova & Brésil
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

To say that all roads of modern Brazilian music lead back to Jo~ao Gilberto would be a stretch; Tom Jobim, who wrote many of the songs Jo~ao famously interpreted, merits at least as much of a claim as progenitor as Jo~ao does; and, well, there’s that whole century-old tradition of samba out of which both men sprang, which they internalized and then brilliantly reconceived. But it wouldn’t be a huge stretch. Listen to Caetano Veloso (who refers to Jo~ao as “mi maestro”) sing a song like “O Leaozhino” off Bicho (1977); to the seductive marriage of guitar and voice, the perfect garnishing of nonsense syllables, on the title track from Novos Baianos’ Acabou Chorare (1972); to the nasally-sensual singing style of Chico Buarque on most any cut, but especially softly swooning ones like “No Fala de Maria” from the fourth Chico Buarque de Hollanda record (1971): these artists are all Jo~ao’s issue (more than Jobim’s, more than anyone’s), and all of them are quite outspoken about this fact; while they made albums that sold in far greater quantities than those of the old master, all are more or less made in Jo~ao’s image, and their musical visions pick up where Jo~ao’s leaves off. What this means is that at the very center of the Brazilian music pantheon is one of the most enigmatic, eccentric creatures in all of twentieth-century pop culture-one who, though he has triggered more scrutiny, speculation, and spilled ink than just about any other figure in MPB, will always remain essentially a puzzle. Other music traditions from the last century were inaugurated by loud, flamboyant showmen-Elvis Presley writhing his loins on the Milton Berle show, Louis Armstrong pandering to white audiences’ fetish for black minstrelsy, Jimi Hendrix lighting his guitar on fire at the Monterey Pop Festival. As the almost single-handed creator of bossa nova, though, Jo~ao-reclusive, nocturnal, notoriously uncooperative-seems as unlikely a candidate for celebrity as a person can be. Yet armed with a new kind of music-a languid, sparse music marked by autumnal rustlings-he staged a sudden, decisive coup through sly, subversive whispers. He was a shy, awkward prophet preaching a gospel of silence, of hushed intimacy; and, on the strength of a couple of singles (“Chega de Saudade” and “Desafinado”), he turned the whole of Rio de Janeiro on its head, cleansing it of the excesses of 1950s samba and ushering in a new dispensation. It’s a dispensation that Brazilian musicians have never really left.
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João Gilberto – Na Casa de Chico Pereira 1958: Demo Sessions For A Sound That Seduced The World! (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:09:34 minutes | 756 MB | Genre: Bossa Nova
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla

João Gilberto (born João Gilberto Prado Pereira de Oliveira – Portuguese: [ʒuˈɐ̃w ʒiwˈbɛʁtu]; June 10, 1931 – July 6, 2019), was a Brazilian singer, songwriter, and guitarist, who was a pioneer of the musical genre of bossa nova in the late 1950s. Around the world he was often called “father of bossa nova”; in his native Brazil, he was referred to as “O Mito” (“The Legend”).
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