"Águas de Março (The Waters of March)" by Antônio Carlos Jobim & Elis Regina

Kirk digs into the work of master composer Antônio Carlos Jobim
via his timeless 1974 duet with Elis Regina on his song "Águas de
Marçco," known Stateside as "The Waters of March." He's joined by
special guest Frederico Barros, Professor of Musicology at
Federal University of Rio De Janeiro.


Written by: Antônio Carlos Jobim


Performed by: Jobim and Elis Regina


Album: Elis & Tom (1974)


Listen/Buy via Songwhip


ALSO DISCUSSED:


"The Girl From Ipamena" and "Desefinado" by Tom Jobim from
Getz/Gilberto, 1964

"Corcovado (Quiet Night of Quiet Stars)," "Triste," and
"Bigras Nunca Mais" by Jobim from Elis & Tom, 1974 and
Getz/Gilberto, 1964

"Felicidade" by Jobim recorded by Vince Maggio and Mark Colby
from Reunion, 1999

Chega de Saudade by Jobim as recorded by the Dizzy Gillespie
Sextet



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FRED'S PLAYLIST NOTES:


1 x 0 - traditional choro, Pixinguinha playing sax and sort
of inventing “Brazilian counterpoint” - in the second part of
this piece, when it modulates to G major, you’ll hear the sax
play a rhythmic figure important to Aquarela do Brasil (see
below);

Espinha de Bacalhau - choro, played by an orchestra that was
created with the aim of playing Brazilian music in the manner of
American Big Bands;

O Relógio da Vovó - the Trio Surdina was comprised of
musicians who worked at the Radio Nacional (where Jobim would
also work as an arranger) and whose compositions and way of
playing were fundamental to the development of “modern” Brazilian
music - yes, Desafinado!;

Aquarela Brasileira - Radamés Gnattali was an arranger at
Radio Nacional and this arrangement of Ary Barroso’s Aquarela do
Brasil is kind of an inflexion point - the story is (always) more
complicated, but the TL;DR is its importance lies in the use of
samba rhythm in the orchestral parts, not only in the percussion
section, as was previously usual (attention to the long notes in
the melody accompanied by the same chromatic figure played by the
tenor sax in 1 x 0 above);

Copacabana - there are two versions of the song here, both
sung by Dick Farney (Sinatra’s influence on him is pretty clear).
The first one was arranged by Radamés Gnattali and was a huge hit
at the turn of the 1940s to the 50s. The song is kind of a symbol
of the stylistic change from live music in cassinos (closed by
the government in 1948) to small clubs in Copacabana where Bossa
Nova and Samba-jazz would eventually be born;

Copacabana (second version) - also sung by Dick Farney, but
recorded much later (couldn’t find the exact date) now in
complete Bossa style - I thought it could be interesting to be
able to compare both versions;

Chega de Saudade - João Gilberto’s 1959 recording of Chega de
Saudade. Considered by practically everyone interested in music
at that time as sounding absolutely novel and unprecedented: the
singing, the lyrics, the arrangement, the guitar playing. Kind of
Bossa Nova’s inaugural moment, the song has kind of a choro form
and I once saw Jobim say in an interview that he had the idea
when he saw his mother’s housemaid singing the choro Sonoroso and
he thought something like “well, it seems people can remember a
long melody and all these lyrics, after all…”;

Chega de Saudade - following the commentary I made about
Chega de Saudade and the choro, here a 1963 version - right in
the period where it was all happening - by the old-school
mandolinist Jacob do Bandolim;

Estamos Aí - sung here by Leny Andrade in her debut album,
totally positioned as “Modern Popular Music”, as they would
define it, it shows very clearly the new style that was emerging
- the whole scat singing section in the middle is really pointing
to jazz and the lyrics talk about Bossa Nova itself;

Rapaz de Bem - Johnny Alf is one of the unsung heroes and
precursor of Bossa Nova: the singing, the harmonic language, the
compositional aesthetics… it was all there;

Embalo - a typical example of what was called samba-jazz back
then;

Influência do Jazz - by one of the early Bossa Nova
composers, Carlos Lyra, the song talks about how samba was
influenced by jazz in a somewhat ambivalent manner and has
acquired sort of a symbolic, manifesto-like status - we hear a
younger Elis Regina singing it here, in the famous program/series
O Fino da Bossa;

Preconceito - two versions, first Orlando Silva’s old school
version (1941), then João Gilberto singing the same song years
later (2003) and doing his thing;

Aos Pés da Cruz - one of the classic João Gilberto
recordings. I added it to the playlist just because it’s so
beautiful;

Elis’ first recording of Águas de Março is interesting
because the guitar “levada” is sort of middle ground between the
“modern samba” that will be so characteristic of her band’s
playing and the more subdivided earlier style of playing samba;

Coisa N. 1 - Moacir Santos was also an arranger (they were
called maestros, actually) at Rádio Nacional, where Jobim,
Radamés, the Trio Surdina guys and many other important musicians
worked. Moacir was the only black maestro of the time and had
studied with classically-trained composers like Guerra-Peixe
(also a maestro at Rádio Nacional) and H. J. Koellreutter (German
composer who fled Germany during the rise of the Nazis and is
credited as having introduced dodecaphonism in Brazil). He wrote
the “Coisas” (Things) and numbered them as if they were “Opus 1”,
“Opus 2” etc. Moacir is an entire chapter in itself and
unfortunately one can’t find the original 1966 recording of the
Coisas on Spotify, which used practically all important “modern”
musicians living in Rio de Janeiro at the time. This recording
was made in 2001 with Moacir’s approval and is true to the
original arrangement, though the solos were improvised by the
musicians;

O Mestre Sala dos Mares - written by Elis’ contemporaries
João Bosco and Aldir Blanc, we first listen to Bosco’s recording
of this samba, more in the traditional style, with percussion,
cavaquinho, 7-string guitar and all, and then Elis’ version with
most of the band that recorded Elis & Tom - sorry for
insisting with the comparison thing, but I think it’s instructive
and it takes a lot of examples to start grasping some subtleties;

É Com Esse Que Eu Vou - first listen to Elis’ version and
then the traditional one. This is carnival music, really, and
they did this wonderful modern, samba-jazzy version;

Como Nossos Pais - another, arguably as important, side of
Elis. From 1976, this is perhaps her most famous recording and
serves here to show that her repertoire was considerably wider
than samba. People get really moved by this recording
(understandably, at least to my Brazilian ears) and despite the
stylistic differences, this is also the same core band we hear in
Elis & Tom.