His new show, presented for the first time in Canada, filled us with well-known tunes and some of the 16 short songs of Portasher album released in 2021. With its eight musicians who witnessed the singer’s peak, we soared very high in the spheres of bliss and joy!
Pelo tempo que durar (as long as it lasts) begins the recital, she, with her little guitars and her arm gestures that come and go, the artist establishes an incredible communion with her audience, hungry to see her again in flesh and blood. Marisa de Azeve do Monte is as well known in Brazil as Diane Dufresne is here.
She’s already on stage when the curtain is pulled up, wearing a long black dress and wearing a sparkling crown on her hair, too, like jet black, and a smile as big as the bay of Rio. Two stage assistants will come to change her dresses, a white one then one with 1920s motifs.
A dream cast with her, that the cream of musicians who are all composers, some of whom have spawned with the emblematic figures of Brazil, Dadi the first, who wrote for Caetano Veloso, whom she presents at length, shows us her highs feats of arms. The bassist does not need to leave the country of Neymar to spread his fame. And there he is!
Pretinho da Serrinha is the essential percussionist and plays the cavaquinho, a small guitar ideal for playing samba.
Chico Brown, yes, yes, the son of the illustrious Carlinhos Brown who made the Big Event of the Jazz Festival in 2007 (at the time when there was only one Big Event) and grandson of Chico Buarque, no less, sits with his acoustic guitar. He is the main writing partner of the composer, who, incidentally, owns her catalog of songs, her editions, in addition to managing all aspects of her career. She sees everything!
A small brigade of three brass instruments gives all the punch to the proposals stuffed with soul and sometimes resembling cabaret music, always with this samba common thread. Sometimes, it even looks like a Brazilian Françoise Hardy, it’s subtle, rich, caressing, the singular universes of Brazilian music have done well to transport us.
We talk about Maria Bethânia, Gal Costa, who died last year, Elis Regina and other geniuses such as Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Vinicius de Moraes and Buarque, the great schools, from Salvador de Bahia to the sound of Rio, we took our foot!
Too hot
We were literally suffocating last Tuesday evening at the Théâtre Maisonneuve for the long-awaited return of the inspiring Brazilian poetess. No air conditioning in the room, in the entrance on the lower level, yes. We were sweating profusely, many spectators had their fans in action, someone in the middle of the floor was taken ill, the show was interrupted for at least 20 minutes, the lights turned on again in the room, total anticlimax . Halfway through the concert.
No member of staff came to assist the person!
Left to their own devices, the spectators around were crying out for help. Lots of people standing on the two balconies as on the floor, worried. Finally four guys in no hurry arrived. The person collapsed again coming out of his row and remained on the sides. Marisa Monte and her group remained incredulous at the situation.
Meanwhile, female admirers rushed to the foot of the stage as the concert was interrupted to be caught in selfie with the diva, unconcerned with what was going on. It was surreal.
In short, we hope that it went better last night. Marisa Monte filled her two rooms, attended it goes without saying by a very strong contingent of Portuguese and Brazilians who came to meet their star. And who sang, sang and sang with her every word of her evanescent songs. We had tears in our eyes. The tidal wave of love for the girl from Rio de Janeiro who just turned 56 was triumphant.
obrigado, Maria!