REVIEWS
Beatriz Azevedo is an award-winning actress and poet, as well as a subversive singer-songwriter. She combines traditional Brazilian rhythms like Maracatu and Maxixe with fiercely individual lyrics, tempered by beguiling musical quirkiness — hardly surprising when her band includes musicians who’ve played with Tom Waits and David Byrne.
This live airing of highlights from her catalog glides between romance and the artiness of the avant-garde, and is a suitably polished introduction to the queen-in-waiting of new Brazilian pop.
CHRIS NICKSON [Wonderingsound, UK]
Beatriz Azevedo is anthropophagic, a modern Tropicalist; her music mixes traditional rhythms, contemporary grooves and poetry. With huge musical and poetic creativity, Beatriz Azevedo is the Brazilian artist you must follow.
SANDRINE TEIXIDO [Vibrations, France]
Beatriz Azevedo captures the essence of traditional Brazilian rhythms without making them sound old and rehearsed, always making sure to heat things up with her own personal style.
KERRY MCNEIL [CMJ New York]
The extraordinary new recording by Beatriz Azevedo has it all – high literary erudition, carnavalesque exuberance, absurdist humor, and audacious experimentalism – the hallmarks of antropofagia.
CHRISTOPHER DUNN [USA] “Brutality Garden: Tropicália and the emergence of a Brazilian Counterculture” (Chapel Hill).
Beatriz Azevedo sings Kurt Weill with elegance. Her version of “Speak Low” is as sexy as the singing of Anita O’Day or Billie Holiday.
LAURENCE ALOIR [Radio France, Paris]
Beatriz Azevedo’s position musically stands alongside Tom Zé, (Bahian, longtime inhabitant of São Paulo), Itamar Assumpção, Arnaldo Antunes, André Abujamra (Karnak), all Paulistas, all multi-artistes. With this CD, one can gauge that Beatriz is not the mistress of a certain type of culture or philosophy, nor a complicated musician. It’s Pop – not the pop music of mass-consumption – she is Pop in the sense of Pop Art.
JIN NAKAHARA [JAPAN]
Beatriz, we bought your book to have your autograph, a pact of letters and ink and for you to continue your work. My own copy of “Peripathetic” was so often read that the pages show signs of handling. It will be mailed to your house for you to put your spell and your signature on, and then to send it back to me again, the reader and owner of the book that was yours and now is ours.
TOM ZÉ [Tropicalist musician and composer, released in US by Luaka Bop’s albums Fabrication Defect, The Hips of Tradition, Brazil Classics 4:Tom Zé, and others]
Beatriz Azevedo’s mix of melodies, rhythms and poetry place her in a unique position
in Brazilian music. Everything in her work sounds different, special. Collaborating with
Beatriz makes me more observant and attentive. Yes, I’m her partner and it’s my pleasure.
VINICIUS CANTUÁRIA [composer, artist]
Perhaps the latest in a great, historic line of poet-songstresses from Brazil, Beatriz’s singing is reminiscent of the world star of MPB, sassy Marisa Monte, as much as the likes of the late, vulnerable-voiced Elis Regina. The album from which Cena is taken, (“Bum Bum do Poeta”, which also boasts the Celso Sim-sung, Azevedo-penned gem Circo), ranges from lounge lizard dub to quirky country samba, with the São Paulo siren announcing herself as a major songwriter and singer of great personality.
RICK GLANVILL [England / UK]
Chosen by Gilberto Gil to represent her country at the Soccer World Cup in Germany, the songwriter and singer Beatriz Azevedo will perform in Paris at L’Entrepot et at the Divan Du Monde. Mixing percussion, traditional grooves and new rhythmic patterns, Beatriz Azevedo performs with great musicians from Brazil in her band.
C. N. [Le Parisien, Paris, France]
Beatriz Azevedo embodies originality and class in the world of contemporary Brazilian music. Having earned the respect of discerning music lovers around the world, particularly in her native Brazil, in the UK, and in Japan, she makes a rare appearance in NY tonight.
DANIEL SHIRAI [Flavorpill – New York]
Brazilian singer Beatriz Azevedo is as much poet as songwriter. Her samba-driven arrangements may put you in mind of Arto Lindsay, as will her relaxed vocal delivery. K. WILLIAMS [Time Out – New York]
Beatriz Azevedo is a recognized Brazilian artist making an extended visit to New York. She is an extremely energetic creative artist and performer. Her lyrical side extends to songwriting and performing, as she has released her first CD “Bum Bum Do Poeta” on Caetano Veloso’s label Natasha Records. All these achievements and her bright personality make Beatriz Azevedo a special artist.
CHARLES ANDREWS PERRONE [USA] Ph.D., author of Masters of Contemporary Brazilian Song and Brazilian Popular Music and Globalization.
Beatriz Azevedo as a poet is chilling. That is, she dwells deep within the essence of being, without ever losing the subtleties of form. From her album Bum Bum Do Poeta, to the sacro-profane performance Peripatético Poema De Chão, we see a common denominator: diamond like and brightly moving like a ballerina of wisdom. Beatriz Azevedo is not only eternal and modern, she is the junction and atomization of vigour, of talent and beauty.
JORGE MAUTNER [Poet and Songwriter, Grammy winner “Caetano Veloso e Jorge Mautner: Eu Não Peço Desculpa”].
It is the first time that I sing on a CD and participate in a show with a band, I have never done this in my life. Theatre’s greatest refinement is when theatre turns into music, when theatre turns into dance. It’s when prose disappears and all becomes poetry. Beatriz is a contemporary woman in this sense, she is an actress and a poet, above all, a poet, an extraordinary poet. By being a poet, she wants to be a poet in everything, and she is achieving exactly that, by mixing everything, and this mix is every artist’s desire.
ZÉ CELSO MARTINEZ CORREA [Director of Teatro Oficina, Brazil’s leading Tropicalist theatrical company].
The album contains one tango arrangement of “Insensatez”, (Jobim/ Vinícius), and “What Is This Thing Called Love”, by Cole Porter, that starts in a jazz ambience, (Beatriz’s voice remembers Marlene Dietrich!), before changing to the rhythm of Jongo. If the concert in NY was recorded by surprise, would be fair that, now, the show be filmed to a future DVD, because of the importance of it’s visual aspect.
DANIEL ACHEDJIAN [Tropicalia, Belgium]
Being a “multi artist” is kind of fashion now. However, it’s rare to find an artist that is really so truly “multi” as how much Beatriz Azevedo is. In fact it is necessary to research her, she is far from making self promotion of all her talents.
BETH NÉSPOLI [Caderno 2, Estado de São Paulo]
