Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Tributo a Waldir Azevedo

I'd love to point you to a great recording titled Tributo a Waldir Azevedo - O Mestro Do Cavaquinho. It was released by Inter CD Records 7895509210257.

This record is a tribute to the Brazilian cavaquinho player Waldir de Azevedo, who died in 1980. Waldir became famous because he made a real solo instrument of the cavaquinho.

He started on flute and bandolim and later changed to the cavaquinho. He became a professional player around 1940 aged 17 years old and joined the band of Dilermando Reis. This regional played in a radio program of Radio Club of Brazil. Later he became the leader of that band.

He made a bunch of LPs during the 1950s and 1960s and a left in 1971 for the new build city Brasilia to found a choro tradition. As said before - Azevedo is remembered as the man who gave the cavaquinho his own solo repertoire. One of his most famous compositions is Delicado, also to be found on this tribute album. It became a hit in the 1950s ( In 1952 Percy Faith & Stan Freeman gave this tune a place into the Dutch Top 40 ).


Another well known tune is Brasileirinho, the opening track of this album.
The musicians on this album are: Valmar De Amorim and Marcio De Almeida on cavaquinho ( Cavaco solo ). De Almeida is also on the 6 string guitar ( viola de 6 cordas). Deo Rian and Bruno Rian are on the bandolim. Andre Belliney plays the 7 string guitar ( violoa de 7 cordas), the guitar who has an extra bass string. Darly A. Guimaraes plays the pandeiro, a Brazilian percussion instrument.
Deo Rian was a student of Jacob do Bandolim and reformed, after the death of Jacob his band Epoca de Ouro. They played the so-called samba de morro tunes with a lot of success. This band played an important part in the revival of choro during the 1970s and 1980s.
About the cavaquinho and Waldir Azevedo an excellent blog titled The Cavaquinho is written.
The Choro web log ( http://choro-music.blogspot.com ) is a great starting point to explore the Choro tradition. Joergen Larsen, the Danish expert researched this kind of Brazilian music and shares his passion on this web log.
This contribution is also posted at Keep swinging web log
Keep swinging
Hans Koert

1 Comments:

Blogger Jo said...

Thank you, Hans.

An informative introduction to a great artist. Waldir Azevedo is still remembered in Brazil and around the world, the tribute album mentioned in your article is a proof that his music is still worth listening - the album is a great tribute, indeed.

Jo

02 January, 2007  

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