Sunday, June 3, 2012

Brazilian Chestnuts

Since it's been a busy several days since I last blogged, we've collected a bunch of great stories that definitely merit telling. I'll share a couple of them, but although both definitely deserves its own entry, we're playing at Copacabana in just a few hours, so I'm going to have to do a bit of condensing.

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A few days back, we went to a restaurant with which Tony is well acquainted. It was fairly late and after we'd played a show, so a little less than half the band went. I was definitely beat, but Tony has talked about this restaurant for months, and promised us the food and dancing (both of which come from the northeastern part of Brazil, the Bahia region) would be superb. He wasn't wrong! The restaurant was fairly deserted--no doubt due in part to the concurrent Brazil vs. United States soccer game, another reason some of the band didn't go--so we mostly had the place to ourselves. After gorging ourselves on the half dozen dishes brought out, we got up and headed to the dance floor, where a trio was playing baiĆ£o music: a zabumba (like a bass drum), a triangle, and an accordion. Fortunately, the step wasn't too difficult, and Tony and his relatives were great teachers. Before long, everyone was dancing! It went on for at least an hour and a half, and by the end were were sweaty, exhausted, and ecstatic.
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On Thursday, we played a show at the Teatro Municipal Paulo Machado de Carvalho in Sao Paulo. It was a fun show, and everything went well, though the audience seemed a little subdued. After our encore, Tony told some of us that we should go hang out outside the concert hall and talk to people, despite the fact that none of us spoke Portuguese. We went on out, and quickly found ourselves in an awkward situation. About ten of us were standing on one side, and about ten feet across from us, about half the audience was milling about, staring at us and speaking quietly to one another. I tried to break the tension by announcing, "Nao folla portuguese, but... muito obrigado!" (I don't speak Portuguese, but... thank you very much!) It worked (kind of) and they clapped again, but then they started shouting at us to play more. Some of us still had our instruments, and one of the audience members shouted "CHAMELEON!!" (by Herbie Hancock), so we broke out into an impromptu jam. I laid down the bass line on the bari, and a few trumpets and sax players did melody and then took turns soloing. It ended up being about a ten minute jam, and after that, they wanted still more! Someone shouted "CANTALOUPE ISLAND!!" (also by Herbie), so we tried that, and although I'm pretty sure I did most of the chord changes wrong, it was still a lot of fun to play in front of an active audience that had mostly been passive throughout the night's show.

Time to suit up for the show -- ate amanha!

2 comments:

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  2. A great trip--and local dancing and beaches, too. I realize I'm old when Herbie Hancock pieces become "standards." It's great you all could pull those arrows from your improv quiver.

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