"Moacir Santos (1924–2006) was a Brazilian composer, multi-instrumentalist and music educator. Baden Powell de Aquino and Wilson das Neves both studied under him. As a composer, Santos worked with Nara Leão, Roberto Menescal, Sérgio Mendes and Lynda Laurence, among others." wiki
" One of the main Brazilian arrangers, having renovated the country's harmonic language in the '50s, the underrated Moacir Santos had nevertheless a highly influential role as he had as his pupils, in the '60s: Paulo Moura, Oscar Castro-Neves, Baden Powell, Maurício Einhorn, Geraldo Vespar, Bola Sete, Sérgio Mendes, Dom Um Romão, João Donato, Roberto Menescal, Carlos Lyra, Dori Caymmi, Airto Moreira, and Flora Purim, among others.
Owner of a distinctive Brazilian style as a composer and arranger, Santos' most-known tunes are "Nanã" (written with Mário Teles), which had over 150 different recordings (including those by Herbie Mann and Kenny Burrell); and "Coisas" (number one to 12); not to mention a series of compositions with Vinicius de Moraes ("Triste de Quem," "Menino Travesso," "Se Você Disser Que Sim," "Lembre-Se"), who praised him in his "Samba da Benção." Having written the arrangements for, among others, Vinicius de Moraes e Odete Lara (1963), Santos also composed the soundtracks for the films Love in the Pacific, Seara Vermelha (an adaptation of Jorge Amado's novel, directed by R. Aversa), Ganga Zumba (Cacá Diegues), O Santo Médico (Sacha Gordine), and Os Fuzis (Ruy Guerra), among others." AMG
***This album has been quite rare for a long time - the original Forma vinyl sells for over $1,000 and the cd reissue disappeared rather quickly so it sells for big bucks as well. This album made the New York Times 100 essential Jazz albums!***
Coisas 1965.rar
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An obscure but true classic! Great tunes and beautiful arrangements! Also worth checking is "Ouro Negro", a tribute cd to - and with - Moacir Santos recorded shortly before his death by Mario Adnet.
ReplyDeleteI've heard a couple of others by Santos, but not this one - many thanks.
ReplyDeleteWow KC! An unknown [to me] treasure . . . thanks for this listen!!!
ReplyDeleteAs a young itinerant self-taught player, he earned the nick-name "sax-monster" and was truly an absolute monster of music in Brasil - where he is far from obscure.
ReplyDeleteHis status and achievements back home, encouragement from Sergio Mendes, the example of Jobim, and the success of "Coisas", made 1967 look like the right and ripe time for him and Cleonice to chance a move to Hollywood, where he ended up juggling whatever work he found - pick-up gigs from the union hall, Sunday piano for a south-side baptist church, long-term substitute teaching courtesy of intro from Gary Foster, private teaching at home in Pasadena, un-credited ghosting for Mancini - ("Sometimes I am the ghost of the ghost. Supposing the ghost had a lot of work, so he gets yet another ghost... Right, I was a ghost like that. I only got credit for one movie ..."), I think he faded into relative obscurity in Pasadena - but nevertheless seemed content - with no interest in going back home. Until the end.
I struggled hard transcribing "Coisa #5" and "Coisa #3" (my favourite) and learned a huge amount just trying to deconstruct those African-rooted interlocking rhythmic complexities that made it all seem so deceptively simple.
Bloody brilliant.
New to me too, so a great start to the weekend. Thanks KC
ReplyDeleteMuito agradecido (Thank you a lot), KingCake!
ReplyDeleteListened to this, this morning. Real beauty. Many, many thanks for the dl and turning me on to this artist.
ReplyDeleteMany thanks, KingCake! Tasty music!
ReplyDeleteThis may be nit-picking somewhat with the AllMusic biographical data, but it's a poor representation of reality to say that "Nana" was written WITH Mario Telles. "Nana" is more the happy result of Telles writing a lyric for the already written and recorded "Coisa #5". The Telles lyrics understandable had the result of enormously expanding the popularity of the piece - because now there were words for vocal artists to sing - and helped it become for Santos pretty much equivalent to the place of "Watermelon Man" for Herbie. Yup. I s'pose it is nit-picking. But I wrote an assignment last year on the composer and this tune - and this niggling correction might be the only good purpose I can put it to.
ReplyDeleteOh - I also discovered that the 25-bar intro to the tune on "Coisas" is recycled from some other piece of movie music that he wrote - I found the clip once by divine accident on YouTube, but I'm buggered if I can dig-up the link right now.
Anyway, it amuses me to picture his recollections of being a five-year old orphan and leading a group of little friends naked with pots and cans around the dusty streets of tiny Flores do Pajeú.
What a life, to turn himself into a self-taught sax-monster.
And such fabulous music.
Afro-Brasil.
Isn't it great when you download something on spec and it turns out to be wonderful. This is one such instance!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for letting me hear about Mr. Santos, KingCake.