Summer/Winter

One World

10PM in Blaine. Photo by Jovino Santos Neto

Hello, Substack friends,

It has been a busy season, and I apologize for the scarce posts (is this what they mean by “post-scarcity”?). I spent all of last week teaching at the Blaine Harbor Music Festival in Blaine, WA, located right at the Canadian border. Even though it is a busy border crossing, most of the town is very laid back and quiet, which was great for biking between my host family’s home and the school, where I spent the week working with young musicians and jamming with the great faculty, including trumpet master Charlie Porter, violinist Majid Khaliq and saxophonist Nick Biello. We played several concerts in the street plaza and and also in the nice theater in the school.

The view from the street stage in Blaine, WA. Photo by Jovino Santos Neto.

I took the opportunity to practice the music I will be premiering next week in Manaus, Amazonas, where I will be featured at the Amazonas Green Jazz Festival with a big band led by Rui Carvalho, playing my music, including a brand new world premiere of A Onça E O Pajé (The Jaguar And The Shaman). This 10-minute piece for jazz orchestra tells the story of an Amazonian shaman (Uyú-Puyú-Yrá) and a black jaguar (Yaguaretê-pixuna). The shaman hunts the jaguar to obtain its shin bone in order to make a jacuí, or sacred flute for a ritual ceremony. The jaguar, on the other side, would like to hunt the shaman to feed its young. The drama plays out musically, with the jaguar’s movements represented by a smooth swing groove, and the shaman’s motions translated as a telluric stomping groove, borrowing from native Brazilian and West African patterns.

In addition, I am also going to my home town of Rio de Janeiro to play at the Blue Note club there in a trio with Marcio Bahia on drums and João Paulo Barbosa on bass. Here’s a sample of our sound when I was there last November:

The Blue Note has a YouTube channel and they usually stream their shows live. If you wish to see us playing, check out the link this Friday, July 29 starting at 10:30PM Rio time (9:30 PM Eastern, 6:30 Pacific). I hope you will enjoy the music.

So in the next few weeks I will go from a Northern hemisphere summer to a Southern hemisphere winter to an Equatorial rainforest where there are no seasons. One World!

Thanks for your continued support. I encourage you to upgrade to a paid subscription, which will be translated into more music and many more posts!

Obrigado,

Jovino