I start this week’s log w/ choro school on Saturday morning- a fine place to begin. EPM (Escola Portatil da Musica) is one of the main reasons I am here in Rio. Started by Luciana Rabello and Mauricio Carrilho of Acari Records, it’s an all-day Saturday choro school with a staff that is a veritable who’s-who of contemporary choro greats in Rio. I arrive in plenty of time this week for the teaching roda @ 9:00, in fact I am one of only about 4 or 5 there w/ Alvaro Carrilho, flutist & a scion of the Carrilho dynasty in choro, who is running the class. Well, we are 5 until the doors open @ 9:30 & the masses flood in. (Is that when the cool people arrive? Or did they just all get caught chatting outside & sent in?) Still there are only a couple of soloists- tons of guitars- so I get to play 2 songs- Cochichando, that I share w/ the student flutist, and Eu Quero Sosego, that I play alone. It’s the first time I’ve got to do more than comp chords @ a teaching roda so I am relieved that it goes well.
In Bandolim2 class I play my memorized Diabinho Maluco- just forgetting a bit of the 3rd section in the pressure of the moment, and we’re to make up a counterline for next week. Only Jesse shows up for B3- even Andre is missing- guess everyone was daunted by last week’s Luperce waltz. But I get Jesse to help me fill in the blank spots in the first section, that he has learned, and Pedro obligingly plays a slow version of the whole thing for me to film. So I’ll try to have it for next week. Bandão is fun & features a chorus of students singing the Tom Jobim tune we’re doing. Afterwards I stop in for a sanduiche & acai @ Laguna Lanche on my way home to pick up my amp & music stand for the 3:00 roda @ Romulo’s.
Romulo has missed EPM (Marcia says I should tell him that it’s absolutamente injustificavel, but I think just so she can be amused by my pronunciation), but arrives @ 2:30 to pick Marcus & me up for his roda. It’s basically Agua no Feijão, but Michel can’t come so there’s a sub pandeiro, and Raphael will be late, so Luiz is coming to play guitar. It’s seems odd to me that this isn’t an AnF rehearsal- as we could use one- or a meeting about the CD. There are issues we need to discuss, not the least of which is the caricature that is supposed to be our cover. R has emailed out a copy & to my mind it’s kindof creepy, not the sort of thing that would make anyone to want to hear our music. We look somewhat like rats in a pot of beans, and Pablo- the cutest man in the world- looks especially grotesque. I’m the next worst, looking kindof like Hilary on a bad day.
But with these guys it’s music first, so we play. Pablo is in a goofy mood & at one point launches into “Hit the Road, Jack,” and the pandeiro player pulls out a harmonica & begins to wail- too funny. So I join in w/ my best Rich DelGrosso impression. My little amp works better in this enclosed space and I have fun playing some new tunes, and Mariana plays a lovely bossa nova on flute. As folks are leaving, I ask R if we are going to discuss the CD at all. Marcus has gone, but P, R & R & I do. I find myself being v.definite about what will & won’t work, in a way that I haven’t before. But CD production is much more my area of expertise & we just can’t use the caricature as is for the cover, and we have to put some text on the cover other than the band name, so gringos will have some idea what’s inside, and we can’t use a feijoada pot for the cover because noone in the US, including me, even knows what that is… But finally, in true AnF fashion, between us all & Mariana we come up w/ a really good plan & leave happy.
Sunday is São Salvador roda, but it’s threatening rain & about a half hour in begins to drizzle. We retreat to a bar but it’s cramped & noisy & a lot of folks leave. I play awhile but decide not to stay for lunch & head home in the rain. I drop my stuff & talk Miriam into going to the Garota da Urca w/ me for pizza & caipirinhas to ward off the bleak weather, and we do & have a good easy chat- in English for a change! Afterwards I practice some, write some, & try not to get the rainy Sunday blues. On Monday the weather is more of the same, but after a morning writing I take the bus to Ipanema & walk about, get money from the bank, eat lunch, find a little dictionary, buy music books @ Toca da Vinicius, catch the bus back & buy some groceries before heading up the hill for home.
I send out my first log & cook dinner listening to the great new Cristavão Bastos CD & get emails from Brinsley & Nate & my niece Ellis, making it, after all, a good day. Even though it is absolutamente pouring rain & so cold @ night that I fear I am turning into a Carioca & will need a down jacket whenever it dips below 65. Really, I did see a guy in a knee-length down parka in Ipanema today… And- an aside- as I’m typing this it’s 5:25 and the sun has already set. We’ve just passed the shortest day of the year and it’s officially winter.
Tuesday I spend much of the morning working up my classical chops for the duo concert w/ Paulo next week. It really is a different technique than playing choro, and the scale length on the bandolim is quite a bit longer than my Woodley, so there are some adjustments to make. Joel calls & says he still doesn’t know if I can have a lesson tomorrow, but he’ll find out at the recording session tonight and will call tomorrow morning. Talking to him reminds me that I need to redo the score of Isso- my waltz for Joel- to reflect what I am really playing now, rather than what I originally wrote. The rewrite totally sucks me in, and when I try to take a break for lunch I have to give up & go back to the computer because the phrases won’t stop shifting themselves around in my brain.
I finally finish & email it off to Marcilio for an OK on the chords. I grab my jacket & head down the stairs, planning to walk, but as I hit the door I hear TaxiPaulo’s honk-
have I forgotten something? Nope, but he has been to Urca three times today w/ fares & since he has an extra hour this time he decided to see if I was home. We drive down the hill & then walk over to Praia Vermelha & around the neighborhood. He talks me into coming with him for his 4:30 fare- Marcelo’s mother-in-law, who is going to a Dr. appointment. She used to be an opera singer so we chat about Verdi and Puccini. P has to wait for her appointment to be finished, so he drives me back to Urca & we have a cafezinho & he drops me back @ the corner.
When I get home Isso is waiting in my email- Marcilio has cleaned up the chords and reformatted the score so it looks much better. Wow, how nice is he! I pack up my things & head out- chatting a minute w/ Sueli on the way- to catch the bus/metro to Rua Gogol Candido for Luiz’ roda @ 7:00. & I get there just before the downpour. It is muito fun w/ Cassio, Romulo, Ana, and Albertinho on the pandeiro & toward the end we are sounding somewhat like a New Orleans Dixieland band w/ all the improvised counterlines blazing.
My favorite moment though is playing the beautiful Evocacão do Jacob w/ the 79-year-old 7-string hot-shot, Valle. We start, and Luiz calls off the troops so noone else joins in, so I’m able to put in all the rubato the piece needs, that the roda-format usually disallows, and Valle knows all the best bass lines and harmonies. Muito legal! I am also quite happy w/ my little amp here. A bit louder would be nice, but I can be heard & can hear myself. At the end of the evening R & I talk to Cassio to confirm that he will be able to record Pitoresco for us next week. & at about 10:30 I say good-bye to all & catch a cab home, as it’s too late to feel sanguine about riding the bus alone.
Well, I was wrong in the glib forecast of the weather schedule that I made last week (I am from New England so I should have known better). It’s been cold and rainy since Sunday, and Wednesday brings more of the same. Joel calls in the morning to say he can do a lesson after all, but when I call TaxiP, he’s in Buzios, but says he can pick me up @ Joel’s afterwards. So I practice my classical rep in the morning, and catch a cab to Joel’s from Urca- a nice chatty guy who actually knows where Rua Enes Filho is.
Joel greets me w/ the question- do you know O Bom Filho a Casa Torna (The Good Son Returns Home)? Well it’s practically Agua’s theme song, so I play it for him by heart. Apparently Hamilton wants to record this on their duet CD & Joel has never played it. So I am in the rare position of showing Joel something new about choro. At the lesson he works with me on ornaments for Gostozinho, and shows me some harmonies he plays on Turbilhão de Beijos. I nearly get through Diabinho Maluco by heart, and he works on my phrasing. And adds a few to the Brazilian finger-bender exercises that I’ve been collecting and inflicting on my students in the US. As the lesson is ending TPaulo calls to say he is stuck in a traffic jam in Niteroi so he won’t make it here in time to get me. But Joel is going into town to a party- his wife has already left- so we share a cab.
I drop my things @ home and head back out again to meet R&M for a concert just as the sky opens up and it starts raining as hard as I can possibly imagine. Luckily there is no wind, so my umbrella helps, but I am soaked from the knees down before I get down the hill & quickly decide that a cab to CCC is a far better idea than public transportation. I practically dive into the first one that stops, trying to avoid stepping in the torrent of water racing down the gutter. But I’m excited about the concert- Eduardo Neves (superhero of sax & flute) playing w/ several of the old Trapiche crew and the samba singer Paulo Moska tonight @ the Centro Cultural Carioca.
The weather incredibly worsens as we drive- it’s almost raining too hard to stay on the road. But I get to the club in plenty of time to snag our reserved table. (You lose your reservation if you don’t arrive an hour before the stated start time of the show.) R arrives shortly thereafter, having been at Mariana’s student samba recital, and M herself comes an hour later, after her class. The show starts (an hour and a half “late”) w/ Edu’s band- a kindof Big-Band version of Trapiche, or a new-formation Pagode Jazz Sardinhas Club. Rui is on clarinet, Rogerio Sousa on 7-string, Luiz Barcelos on bandolim, Andersen on pandeiro, and there’s also electric bass, trumpet, and a drum set. They are knock-out good. Paulo Moska takes the stage after a half-dozen songs, and is a high-energy singer with a Charlie-Chaplin-little-tramp thing going on.
The show is great, but even after a capirinha & caldinha de feijão (and how lovely and interesting that you can buy a mug of bean soup in nearly every bar in Rio) I’m still soaked & cold & sitting in front of huge windows that open out to a little balcony. Charming but chilly, and the club is nowhere warm enough to dry clothes. The show ends @ midnight, and my teeth start chattering in the cab on the way home. When I get there I put on PJs, a sweat shirt, and my one pair of wool sox, & heat up some leftovers to stave off hypothermia (well maybe I exaggerate) and the very real possibility of a cold. But in the morning I, miraculously, wake up fine. And about 10:30 AM the sun finally breaks through the 4-day streak of rain.
Thursday I’m rehearsing w/ Paulo Sa in the afternoon, so go to get copies of our music made in the morning. I get a call from Rodrigo Zaidan as I’m walking home and he wants me to stop by so he can give me a copy of his new solo piano CD, so I do. He’s rehearsing w/ a guitarist for a show that he invites me to, but it’s a time I can’t go. Nice to see him though, and “my” old apartment- where I stayed last January while he was on tour. I head downtown to the Villa Lobos School to meet Paulo & we play through our program, change a couple of pieces, and decide to meet next Tuesday for a final rehearsal before Wednesday’s show. Afterwards we hang out for a bit & get a coffee in the roof-top cantina, where he jokes w/ some of his students & gets them to play us a couple of choro.
It’s end-of-the-semester testing weeks here so everyone is cramming for theory exams and stopping by the table to ask Paulo questions, such as- should Chiquinha Gonzaga’s Gaucho should be played w/ a maxixe or polca rhythm. Paulo is playing the Vivaldi concert somewhere in Minas Gerais on Saturday as well as dealing w/ the end-of-the-semester stuff, and a 1-year-old on an erratic sleeping schedule. It makes me glad that on this visit to Rio I am actually “on holiday” from RWU and so have time to slow down and appreciate being here. On my way home I stop in at a juice stand & catch the end of the Germany/Turkey soccer match on the TV, and watch Germany win- wonder how this looks to Nate in Berlin, probably watching the same game at the same time. So the final match will be Germany/Spain on Sunday. I’m up late working on my music for Saturday’s EPM.
Friday I go shopping for shoes that are not sandals- all the rain has me longing to cover my feet up, and anyway I can’t give a concert next Wednesday in the shoes I’ve brought- and I find some suitable flats @ Rio Sul. In the evening it’s the premiere of Cecelia Lang’s film about Messias. Cecelia is Miriam’s daughter, and I’ve helped a bit w/ translation for the project & have heard Messias play, so I am really looking forward to seeing the film. The opening is at the Parque das Ruinas- a v.cool spot in Santa Teresa. It was a derelict mansion that the 
neighborhood decided should be made into a public space. But instead of turning it back into a mansion, they fixed it up but left it open, and it’s an interesting maze of pathways, stairs, & vistas. There’s an open-air bar on the roof and, as I discover wandering around the spotlit wonderland, a snug auditorium in the basement where the film will be shown.
I meet Miriam there, arriving an hour “late” for the pre-movie music, but having learned about Rio I am not surprised to find that the musicians are just starting their sound check. Messias is center stage, of course, a dapper black man in a white suit, with white hair and a stunningly gorgeous smile. He plays the viola capira- a small guitar w/ an open tuning and a harp-like sound that I love. He also sings, writes 
songs, paints, drinks too much cachaca, and loves life. Cecelia’s film is superb- beautiful and poetic, and really captures his philosophical essense. & the reception is fun- drinking wine on the rooftop, chatting in portugues w/ friends of Miriam & also my former bandmate Carlos & his gf Adriana who live in StaT- but there is no food & we are all starved. So after seeing the film a second time M & I & a friend head out w/ Maize & Tom & her granddaughter Iara- there are 6 of us in the car- to have some dinner at a restaurant in StaT. Home @ midnight, under a beautiful star-lit sky.
Saturday is the longest day in the world. I’m up @ 6:00 & at Praia Vermelha by 7:00 to meet Romulo, Mariana, & Bernard- a friend of R’s & a flutist who is designing our CD cover. Mariana is taking the CD cover photo- instruments w/ a backdrop of sand, sea, and mountains. Idyllic, but of course in real life our concept is complicated by vendors setting up canopies and coolers, and the beach patrol setting out “Perigoso” signs & joggers and bike-riders. But M manages to get the pics and we grab breakfast, and then she & Bernard head out as R & I head over to UniRio for EPM.
The 9:00 roda is skeletal– 2 pandeiros, a beginning bandolimist, and a rhythmically-challenged guitarist (yes, even in Brazil…) but I play Receita da Samba & Diabinho Malucos & then go to my 2 bandolim classes. As I am walking out to Bandão w/ my chair I see R & Marcus & Raphael & remember- no Bandão for me today, we are off to Magé to finish recording our CD. So we load up, drive the hour north, meet Pablo for lunch @ a self-serve in town, and then settle in to get the work done.
We record my Por Que Não?, working from Michel’s recorded pandeiro track. Then Raphael has to put down some counterpoint bass lines & redo a solo. It’s often tedious work, but everyone has fun & is funny throughout- which is why I love these guys so much. No attitude, ego trips, melt-downs, we just enjoy playing music together. At the end we talk to Pablo & adjust some of the mixes—maybe a bit less cavaquinho here, maybe take the bandolim out there- and everyone seems to be in accord. Home @ midnight- an 18-hour day and I am fried.
Sunday I wake up so tired, turn off the alarm and oversleep until almost 11:00- the time the São Salvador roda begins. But I am too tired to pack up & tear off to roda. Somehow even the thought of carrying my amplifier there by bus/metro seems impossible. I move in slow motion, too tired to do more than make a mental note that life is loping ahead w/out me and there are things I am supposed to be doing. I finally call R to say that I will not make it to roda (he had planned not to go) so I can’t confirm our recording plans w/ Cassio there & he says he is so tired too & not to worry he’ll call Cassio later.
Relieved, I decide I should get out of the house anyway & just hang out in the sunshine for a change. So I walk down the hill to the somehow hilarious contrast of be-ribboned boats in the harbor for the procession of São Pedro to my left, and a demonstration against the design school in the soon-to-be-rebuilt Casino on my right. And I decide, for no good reason except that no girl is ever too tired 
to shop, that I will hop on the bus and go to the Feria de Hype (Hippie Fair), held every Sunday @ Praça General Osorio. And I have a fun time buying earrings & a necklace to wear for the concert (from my Amazon seed guy, whose booth has returned), eating Bahian food- a check-pea-flour dumpling w/ something a lot like shrimp gumbo on top, and a heavenly dessert that is a cross between rice pudding and angelfood cake.
It’s sunny and the fair isn’t crowded and the people-watching is amusing, so it takes a couple of hours for me to realize that I am still so tired, and really my day should be done. So I take the bus home, buy my favorite comfort supper- a box of Ades (a fruit & soymilk drink that is so delicious I can’t understand why we don’t have it in the US) & a package of cookies that are a lot like Arrowroot biscuits. It’s the Brazilian equivalent of “animal crackers and cocoa to drink, that is the finest of suppers I think…” from the A. A. Milne poem. And truly it feels like winter here today. “When I grow up and can do as I please…” So I find the Spain/Germany Eurocup soccer game online & flop down in my bed w/ my food & watch it (yay Spain!). And tomorrow I will continue my life as a busy & happy bandolimist in Brazil.
And this log gets almost to the end of June, and almost to today. I’m behind in writing because of music & life, but am sending these words & pics that I hope you will enjoy. More adventures soon, but first, here’s wishing y’all a Happy 4th of July! Which here in Rio will simply be a Friday. All goes well w/ me, and I hope you too. Write to me, queridos, because I miss you all and wonder what you are up to back at home in summer.
Ate breve~
m
