There’s a resurging interest in Brazilian music in New Orleans with numerous new bands and a few veteran acts keeping dance floors grooving. The music runs the gamut from samba to electronica and BrasiNOLA, the newest band on the scene, tore it up the first time they performed. That gig was at the Maple Leaf Bar last fall.
BrasiNOLA is a collaboration between bassist Ron Johnson, a nationally known player who performs with the Gregg Allman Band and has played with a wide range of acts including Aaron Neville, Warren Haynes, and Karl Denson, and a serious cast of local musicians. They play songs from the heyday of the Tropicália movement in Brazil in the late 1960s and 1970s with a New Orleans touch.
Keyboardist and vocalist Eduardo Tozzatto is a familiar face around town from his work with various Latin bands. The same goes for percussionist Nick Solnick. Terence Higgins drums with Ani DiFranco and spent many years with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Danny Abel plays guitar with Gravity A and numerous other bands, and guitarist Sam Dickey plays with Pirate’s Choice, another new band playing around town, as well as with Benyoro, a Brooklyn-based band playing music inspired by the African country, Mali. This is a formidable lineup!
Tropicália aligns in many ways with the music of the 1960s in the United States. The sound is very diverse encompassing folk, rock, funk, psychedelia, and traditional Brazilian music. One significant difference is the music in Brazil was a radical reaction to the dictatorship that ruled the country during the era. Many of the artists were censored and a significant portion went in exile rather than submit to the will of the military rulers.
Johnson’s concept for BrasiNOLA is to create the perfect marriage between the New Orleans beat and Brazilian music. He says, “The NOLA in our name is the foot of the New Orleans drummer.” The first gig featured Jermal Watson, the current drummer for the Dirty Dozen, and Johnson intends to open up the drum chair to any of the long list of New Orleans drummers that might be interested in learning this incredible music.
Expect to hear songs from the legendary Brazilian percussionist Airto, the great singer/songwriter João Bosco and the 1970s fusion band Caldera among many other danceable funky tunes from the wide world of Brazilian music.
