The real roots of Tom Jobim...
Joe Sixpack -- Slipcue.com | ...in Middle America | 12/24/2001
(4 out of 5 stars)
"To really get a feel for how revolutionary Jobim's compositions were, we should look at what a tough time his contemporaries had when they tried to take on the new style Jobim pioneered. This phenomenal 3-CD set collects dozens of rarities from the mid-1950s and early '60s (along with a handful of later recordings) and lays bare the stylistic limitations of the Brazilian pop establishment at the time when bossa nova became king. This collection includes many songs written well before the "official" start of the bossa nova, with performances by artists as diverse as Vicente Celestino, Albertinho Fortuna, Isaura Garcia, Sylvia Telles, Dick Farney, Claudete Soares, and others - some who have faded from history's glance, and others who are still well-known. By now, these melodies are etched in our minds, mainly through the effortless style of performers such as Joao and Astrud Gilberto, and the suave bossa performers that came in their wake. It's instructive, then, to hear the relatively awkward fashion with which the pre-bossa crowd tackled this material, and the surprising stiffness of their performances. Hammy baritones, barbershop-ish vocal groups, chirpy, operatic European-styled female singers populated the landscape, and while they were drawn to the new music, they could not summon the graceful elan that the bossa crowd possessed. Jobim, along with contemporaries such as Carlos Lyra and Vinicius de Moraes, liberated Brazil from the bland anglophilia that had taken root in the postwar era, eradicating the attraction of tepid, safe Edmundo Ros-style pop with one gentle, samba-tinged sweep of bossa's magic wand. Anyone seeking to understand the history of Brazilian pop in general and bossa nova in particular should seek this collection out. The Revivendo label also has an amazing assortment of historical, pre-bossa samba recordings, well worth checking out."
Track Listings (76) - Disc #1