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Pixinguinha (1898-1973) revolutionized the music in Brazil in different aspects: as a composer, arranger and instrumentalist. His fame as a flutist grew thanks to the improvisations that had a big impact on audiences. He wrote his first choros, polkas, maxixes and waltzes in the 1910s, founding his own group, Grupo do Pixinguinha, which later became the prestigious Os Oito Batutas. The groups led by Pixinguinha were very important for the music industry in Brazil. The Orquestra Típica Pixinguinha-Donga participated in various recording sessions in a time when the electric system was a big novelty. He was also the leader of the groups Diabos do Céu, Guarda Velha and Orquestra Columbia de Pixinguinha. He became an arranger at the label Victor in 1929, incorporating Brazilian elements into the traditonal ways of writing arrangements.In the 30s and 40s, he recorded as a flutist and as a saxophonist many pieces that would become the basis of the choro repertoire, for soloist and bands. - During research at the National Library in Rio de Janeiro, Henrique Cazes - choro historian, musician, producer a.o. - found manuscripts including scores of arrangenments for orchestra by Pixinguinha of several of his famous compositions, carefully handwritten by Pixinguinha himself in the late 1940s. Henrique Cazes decided to use Pixinguinha's own arrangements and recreate the sound of a larger ensemble including brass and reed instruments in an contemporary orchestra setting, which resulted in the formation of the Orquestra Brasilia. The Orquestra Brasilia was directed by Henrique Cazes and recorded a cd for the Kuarup label in 1988 (KCD 035), shown below
The cd has twelve pieces by Pixinguinha very well performed by the Orquestra Brasilia, for further info on the recorded music and participating musicians, click here. - To give you an impression of the recorded music, I insert a couple of uploaded audio tracks from YouTube, here is first "Cheguei" as played by Orquestra Brasilia The next video has the audio of "Naquele Tempo " The Orquestra Brasilia later changed its name to Orquestra Pixinguinha and has recorded two more cds since the first release mentioned above, the orchestra is still active and performs from time to time at special live concerts. A photo of current members is shown below. 
Choro performed by larger ensembles may not be the usual setting today, however, the Escola Portátil de Música in Rio de Janeiro does a great job to keep the tradion alive. In 2009 a cd was released by Acari Records containing 12 new arrangements of choro for big band covering compositions by Ernesto Nazareth, Radamés Gnattali, Mauricio Carrilho and Cristóvão Bastos played by two ensembles of professors and students at the Escola Portátil de Música, Furiosa & Camerata Portátil. 
For further info on the contained music and participating musicians, have a look at Discos do Brasil, click here - The Escola Portátil de Música was founded by Maurício Carrilho, Luciana Rabello and Pedro Aragão in 2000, in 2011 the organisation won the Prêmio de Cultura from the state of Rio de Janeiro aknowleding the work being done to educate musicians in performing choro in various settings. During the past years the semesters at the Escola Portátil de Música have ended with a choro festival including concerts by various ensembles, also larger groups performing choro and related music in a big band setting. To end this, I insert a couple of videos showing examples of big band performing at the choro festival of Escola Portátil de Música. - Last year was "Gaucho"(Corta Iaca) by Chiquinha Gonzaga performed by a larger ensemble Another example from last year, "De Urca Pra Pão de Açúcar" (by Amadeu Taborba) - enjoy --- Jo
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We had the following message from Alexandre Dias according the shown flyer (click to enlarge): "It is with great joy that I inform that on March 20th, in commemoration of the 149 years of Ernesto Nazareth, a complete website will be launched in hommage to the King of Choro, with: original scores of his complete works, arrangements for melody and chords, texts about each piece, the complete discography, rare imagens, a time line prepared by the biographer Luiz Antonio de Almeida, besides historical clippings, bibliography and weekly blog. The site will be updated throughout the year, as a countdown to Nazareth's 150 years (March 20th 2013). The release concert will be next tuesday, March 20th, at the Instituto Moreira Salles' auditorium (Rio de Janeiro). You're all invited!" To reach the new website devoted to Ernesto Nazareth, click here---Jo
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Zé Paulo Becker (b. 1968 in Rio de Janeiro) graduated in Music at Uni-Rio and holds a Master´s degree in Guitar from UFRJ. He started his career as a classical guitar player and was awarded first prize at the Concurso Nacional Villa-Lobos (1990). In 1994 he focused his attention on Brazilian popular music and played with well-known artists like Zé Renato, Elza Soares, Armandinho, Marco Pereira, Marcos Ariel, Yamandú Costa, a.o. He is a member of the great Trio Madeira Brasil - the world famous choro ensemble thanks to Kaurismekki's documentary 'Brasileirinho, Choro In Rio' (2005). As a guitar soloist, Zé Paulo recorded the CD 'Lendas Brasileiras' (2001, reissued 2011) with 12 arrangements for guitar from Brazilian popular themes. In 2003, his CD 'Sob o Redentor' came out with his own compositions alone and more than 30 participating musicians. In 2004 and 2005 he toured Europe in concerts, and in 2006 he launched 'Um Violão na Roda de Choro' at the Biscoito Fino label. The cd was considered one of the best of the year (2006) by a Jornal do Brasil´s poll. It contains fourteen new compositions in the choro genre by Zé Paulo Becker and again includes several participating musicians - for detailed info, see Discos do Brasil, click here 
I have only been listening to this cd once from a local streaming service, but it just took me a couple of minutes to find out that the contained music is marvellous and a must-have in your collection for any person addicted to top-class performance of great choro and related music, fortunately the cd is still available from online retailers, Amazon a.o. - The repertoire of the disc has 14 compositions by Zé Paulo Becker covering the wide field of music connected with the choro style. Themes like 'Choro da Miranda', 'De Pernambuco A Nazareth' and 'Endiabrado' pay hommage to past icons like Carmen Miranda, João Pernambuco, Ernesto Nazareth and Jacob do Bandolim, and contemporary performers like Laércio de Freitas ('Choro Pro Tio'), Guinga ('Althierada - Guinguinana 1' and 'Guinguiniana 2'), Egberto Gismonti & Hermeto Pascoal ('Frevo') and Rogério Souza ('Pro Rogério') also get their share. There are also pieces where the guitar is in focus like 'Serena' showcasting Zé Paulo's excellent technique and performance, and moreover a tune like 'Choro Bebop' exposing the range of inspiration involved in the project. - To give you an impression of the music I insert a couple of uploaded YouTube videos below containing tunes available on the cd. Here is first a performance of 'Choro da Miranda' from an Instrumental SESC Brasil show, recorded in 2008 From the same show as above, here is Zé Paulo's solo performance of 'Serena' 
Zé Paulo Becker launched another cd in 2008, 'Pra Tudo Ficar Bem', with more compositions of his own and with guest performance by Ney Matogrosso and Zé Renato a.o. - a disc, I haven't heard yet, but certainly will be looking for. Zé Paulo is a great guitarist, who represents the best of the Brazilian tradition and definitly deserves his high ranking among the herd of great performers of his chosen instrument. - To end this, I insert yet another video from YouTube featuring Zé Paulo Becker in a roda de choro setting recorded at Festival Choro Jazz Jericoacoara 2011 - the tune played is Sivuca's 'Feira de Mangaio' - enjoy! ---Jo
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The "Rainha do choro"/"Queen of Choro", Ademilde Fonseca passed away on March 27th, 91 years old. Ademilde Fonseca died of a heart attack, she will forever be remembered as a unique singer, an expressive and original interpreter of choro and related Brazilian popular music. An obituary in Portuguese and English is available here. R.I.P. 
If you are searching YouTube for Brazilian music, I recommend a visit to the BRAZILIAN MUSIC channel by SenhorDaVoz, click here. - The channel has uploaded c.1900 videos and contains both audio takes of recorded music and video recordings of TV programs.The channel has generated playlists to make the navigation easier. In the playlist for Jacob do Bandolim I was surprised to find some uploaded videos of private audio recordings featuring Jacob do Bandolim, a couple of them taped from radio programs and some from the home of Jacob. Below I insert a video take of a radio performance, Jacob do Bandolim and his conjunto playing "Soluçando" by Cândido Pereira da Silva 
Next week, April the 23th, Dia Nacional do Choro commemorating Pixinguinha's birthday will be celebrated all over Brazil and other places where choro and Brazilian culture is an integrated part of local culture. Be shure to check out local media for information on events in your area.Here at the blog we will mark choro day by commemorating Ademilda Fonseca and her great recording debut of "Tico-tico no fubá" from 1942 - enjoy the "Rainha do choro"/"Queen of Choro" 
Summertime is coming closer this part of the Earth, and if you haven't planned your summer holidays yet, a great option may be to join a week of Summer School learning to play choro. The Dartington International Summer School of Music, England, offers a course of choro 11-18 August directed by João Bosco de Oliveira, more info to be found at the organisation's website, click here ---Jo
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We had the message below from Alexandre Dias, the complete Ernesto Nazareth Discography has just been uploaded at the IMS website. A most comprehensive work is now available here. "It is with immense joy and pride that I inform that Ernesto Nazareth is the first composer in the world to have his discography entirely available online. At the website www.ernestonazareth150anos.com.br - discography section ("discografia/gravações") an extensive table is available, which catalogs around 2.500 recordings of Nazareth's compositions made from 1902 to the present, in the whole world. And to make the catalog richer, 2.043 recordings are available to be listened instantly on stream (downloads are not available). You just have to click on a line, and the player will appear. Then click on the play button. There we have the first Brazilian 78-RPM recordings ever made, in the first decade of the 20th century by legendary Casa Edison, with the military bands and some of the first choro ensembles, going through Nazareth's own recordings, the explosion of his music in 1914 in the U.S. and Paris, the transition period in the 1940s with American influences, the first anthological LPs from the 1950s with Jacob do Bandolim, Radamés Gnattali and Carolina Cardoso de Menezes, the popular singers, his great re-descovery by the pianists Eudóxia de Barros in 1963 and Arthur Moreira Lima in 1975, which led his works definitely into the concert halls, entering the CD era with espectacular arrangements for the most diverse instrumentations, including symphonic orchestra, in a time which Japaneses, Americans, Frenchs, Norwegians, Uruguayans, Canadians, Icelanders, Brazilians, and many others, record him, showing the long reach of his works. This is a previously unpublished research which I've been doing for the past 13 years, which shows that Ernesto Nazareth is one of Brazil's most recorded and cherished composers. To see it made available represents a more-than- dream, which was only possible thanks to the extraordinary vision of Instute Moreira Salles, represented by Bia Paes Leme and Paulo Aragão, also coordinators of the website. Help us spread the word about it. I wish you all a deep dive into the universe of Nazareth's discography, and that you may always marvel yourselves with the possibilities of his music. Cheers, -- Alexandre Dias 
Congratulations to Alexandre Dias and the staff at IMS for managing a great work! --- Jo
