Brazilian star makes rare Seattle appearance

Brazil has supplied the world with a steady stream of percolating popular music for more than a century.

One of its greatest exponents, Milton Nascimento, performs Tuesday and Wednesday in a rare Seattle appearance at Dimitriou's Jazz Alley. Nascimento has not performed here since 1992.

Along with Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil, Nascimento is as good as it gets. Though unknown in this country until saxophonist Wayne Shorter featured the singer-songwriter and guitarist on his 1974 album, "Native Dancer," Nascimento's quavering falsetto and eerily passionate delivery had already made him a star in Brazil in the 1960s.

Unlike so many Brazilian musicians, Nascimento, 68, does not hail from the coast, but from the fabled gold-rush interior state of Minas Gerais. There, in Belo Horizonte, along with Wagner Tiso, Walter Wanderley, Toninho Horta and others, Nascimento came to the fore as part of the "Clube da Esquina (Corner Club)" collective, which crossed samba, jazz and modern rock. Along with Veloso's and Gil's Tropicalia, Clube da Esquina was the other "big thing" in Brazil after its better known precursor, bossa nova.

In 2008, Nascimento saluted the 50th anniversary of the birth of bossa nova with a lovely album of classics, cleverly titled "Novas Bossas." Fittingly, he recorded the album with Paulo and Daniel Jobim, the son and grandson of bossa nova pioneer Antonio Carlos Jobim.

"Novas Bossas" is an unusual album for Nascimento, as he usually includes more Afro-Brazilian and experimental touches in his atmospheric, reverbed music. But hearing him sing "Brigas Nunca Mais (No More Quarrels)" "Dias Azuis (Blue Days)," "Caminhos Cruzados (Crossroads)" and the song that got the bossa ball rolling, "Chega de Saudade (No More Blues)," is an extraordinary pleasure.

At Jazz Alley, Nascimento performs with Lincoln Continentino (keyboards), Wilson Lopes (guitar), Gastavo Villeroy (bass) and Lincoln Cheib (drums). Though Nascimento is no longer promoting "Novas Bossas," he will no doubt sing a few songs from it as well as his own haunting hits, such as "Maria Maria," "San Vicente," "Travessia" and "Coração de Estudante."

This is a show you do not want to miss.

Paul de Barros: 206-464-3247 or pdebarros@seattletimes.com