Monday, July 22, 2013

Brasil Summerfest 2013!

Brazilian music lovers in New York City wait all year for the weeklong series of shows known as Brasil Summerfest. Now in its third year, the festival features both established names and artists relatively unknown in New York, with a goal of exposing Americans to a variety of styles not always associated with Brazilian music.  The 2013 series launched on Saturday, with a free concert at Central Park Summerstage featuring three bands:  Emicida, Gaby Amarantos, and Planet Hemp.


Emicida is a rapper from Sao Paolo, whose initial attempts at self-distribution and promotion were a smashing success, and who has since become one of the best-known voices in Brazilian hip-hop.  Brazilian rap contests, where rappers create impromptu verses in competition, are part of the hip-hop scene in Brazil.  Emicida has won many of these.  Although this was not his first performance in the United States -- he appeared at the 2011 Coachella Music Festival in Southern California -- this was our first exposure to him for many of us New Yorkers.  His energy and his delivery suggest a smart, passionate, and talented artist with origins in a poor family, who cares deeply about his country.


Gaby Amarantos is a pioneer in a style she calls "tecnobrega". Brega (usually translated as "cheesy" or "corny") has been long known in Brazil for its romanticism and sentimentality. Although it has followers all over Brazil, it hasn't engaged a large following outside Brazil. Gaby Amanrantos takes things to a whole other level with her addition of electronica sounds and reggaeton rhythms. Her over-the-top singing, her sequined outfit, and a tiara spelling out her name in shiny silver letters immediately invites comparisons to Liberace. I am not sure what Clara Nunes and Antonio Carlos Jobim, if they were alive today, would have thought of her renditions of "Canto das Tres Raças" and "Waters of March".  The rest of her set was equal parts soulful passion, expansive joy, and histrionics. Here's a video of her performing on TV Pará.  Loved or hated, Gaby Amarantos certainly cannot be ignored.

Planet Hemp was formed by Brazilian rapper Marcelo D2 and Skunk, and is a raucous mixture of psychedelic rock and hardcore.  If Dream Syndicate, the Misfits, and Green Day were to collaborate, the result might sound something like this.  The singing is in Portuguese, and so I missed a lot of the meaning, but was mostly about "maconha" (marijuana) as far as I could tell. Their show was accompanied by videos of people smoking pot in various ways.  Near the front, a mosh pit formed where a bunch of guys were slam-dancing -- which struck me as curious, given the calming effects of the drug the band was promoting.  

In the end, as much as I wanted to hate Planet Hemp, I just couldn't.  They are sincere people and good musicians.  The riffing between slow, almost atmospheric psychedelia and the jarring double-time of hardcore was like a shot of adrenaline, and the slam dancing brought back fond memories for me of punk shows in the East Village in the 1980s, where guys with spiked wristbands aggressively thrashed their arms around during edgy and energetic shows.  The video below captures something of the energy of this performance.  My cell phone camera compressed the sound as best as it could -- it was very loud up close. 



It was a great start to Summerfest.  I am going to try to write about other shows as they come up, though they're scheduled in rapid succession.  Next up will be Casuarina, who took the nightclub S.O.B.'s by storm that same evening, and who played in other venues the rest of the weekend. 






Sunday, July 7, 2013

A Tale of Two Nations

New York's love affair with northeastern Brazilian rhythms is breaking new ground this month, with an appearance at Lincoln Center Out of Doors by Nation Beat and Maracatu Estrelha Brilhante.  Estrelha Brilhante is one of the oldest and largest representatives of the maracatu percussion style -- the infectious, syncopated rhythm from the northeastern state of Pernambuco.  Nation Beat is the performance group within the American percussion school Maracatu New York.  It's headed by Scott Kettner, who has imported these patterns and brought them to American audiences for the past ten years.  The two bands are scheduled to go on the road in the U.S., touring Los Angeles, Miami, Albuquerque, and other locations in a show billed as A Tale of Two Nations, with a full complement of 13 traditional drummers and dancers from Recife (Pernambuco's capitol).  This will be, by all accounts, the first time a maracatu band has toured the United States.  The show, however, is facing some challenges, and will need immediate public support in order to succeed.

It's been a busy year for Scott and his group.  They're releasing a CD in a couple of weeks, titled "Baque do Brooklyn".  An instructional book, co-authored with his wife Michelle Nascimento-Kettner and Aaron Shafer-Haiss, which is the first book in English about maracatu, has also just come out.  This past Sunday, Maracatu New York opened their studios to the public, offering a free lesson and a slideshow to discuss the project.  Everyone was very excited about the prospect of maracatu music being in the American spotlight for the first time.  However, in spite of grants from the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation and American Airlines, other important grant money failed to materialize, and Maracatu New York is appealing to the public through a Kickstarter campaign to make up the shortfall.  (Click here to watch the Kickstarter video.)

Please support this groundbreaking musical endeavor.  As of this writing, A Tale of Two Nations is funded at 60% but only has about another 60 hours left.  As with all Kickstarter fundraisers, if funding doesn't reach 100%, there is no funding from Kickstarter at all.  Estrelha Brilhante will still come to the U.S., but without the full complement of dancers and drummers.  Funds are needed to cover the cost of domestic airline flights, artist fees, hotels, meals, visas, and other incidentals.  There are few things New Yorkers haven't seen before.  A full maracatu band from Northeastern Brazil will undoubtedly be one of them.

Click here to become a supporter.