João GILBERTO
(1931 – 2019)
A quiet man with a guitar, whispering quiet songs of love and summer breezes: João Gilberto single-handedly invented the «bossa nova», the «new wave» of soft and swaying songs that transformed Brazilian music in the 1960s.
Despite the early success of his association with the jazz saxophonist Stan Getz, João Gilberto do Prado Pereira de Oliveira (1931-2019) never had, nor did he seek, an international career comparable to that of his fellow Brazilians Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Antonio Carlos Jobim or Chico Buarque. Yet he is a legend of Brazilian music.
In his fifty years of activity, he released only a handful of gem-like studio albums, and made a few solo appearances on prestigious festival stages, thankfully recorded for posterity.
