Friday, July 25th, 2008

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<p>The daughter of Jo&#228;o Gilberto and Mi&#250;cha, Bebel
Gilberto will bring her eclectic musica

The daughter of Joäo Gilberto and Miúcha, Bebel Gilberto will bring her eclectic musica

Family ties

As the daughter of two prominent musicians – guitarist-singer João Gilberto; and one of Brazil’s most-loved singers, Miúcha – Bebel Gilberto, has been surrounded by music from her birth. Since being in diapers, Bebel has been singing, meeting other musicians and collaborating with other artists, eventually creating a sound that has helped push world music into the 21st century.

Bebel is most famous for taking the now-classic Brazilian sounds and mixing them with electronica, ultimately creating a fusion that is hip enough for the computer age.

Her sound is smooth, subtle and undeniably chill, and it is garnering much attention in the United States, Europe and South America. Currently, Bebel is playing sold-out shows through the United States, and she comes to Royce Hall tonight.

Bebel’s father is widely acclaimed for co-founding bossa nova in the late 1950s with songwriter Antonio Carlos Jobim. Gilberto’s whispery voice and suave demeanor earned him idolization among the beatniks, and his harmonic sophistication gained him a solid spot among the jazz greats. But he never became so esoteric that he couldn’t be appreciated by the mainstream. And indeed he remains one of Brazil’s biggest superstars.

Bebel hasn’t strayed too far from her father’s path. Her 2000 release, “Tanto Tempo,” was one of the widest successes for Brazilian music, selling 650,000 copies outside the United Kingdom. Bebel’s natural musical ability allowed her to effortlessly combine her eclectic tastes, like samba, Chet Baker and Björk into a unique album that struck a chord with fans of world music, jazz and electronica. Appropriately, “Tanto Tempo” even gave rise to a quite popular remix album in 2001.

In “Tanto Tempo,” Bebel’s voice is warm and whispery like her father’s, creating a sense of intimacy that helps draw in the listener. And after trying to create closeness with her listeners, Bebel treats them with a combination of buzzes, pops and beats of electronica that make the music both danceable and emotional. Rather than feeling inorganic like some electronic music does, Bebel’s songs feel distinctly human.

“I was just following my heart,” said Bebel about her creative process. “I’m not a person who sits down and says, ‘I’m going to do this now.’ I really follow my heart and my ideas.”

On “Tanto Tempo,” Bebel collaborated extensively with such artists as Amon Tobin, Smoke City, Carlinhos Brown, João Parahyba and The Thievery Corporation, just to name a handful. Her penchant for collaboration is shown on her most recent release, “Bebel Gilberto,” for which she worked with such eminent musicians as Brazilian singer-songwriter Caetano Veloso, Björk’s producer Marius de Vries, Japanese guitarist Masaharu Shimizu and pianist Daniel Jobim.

Her band even wrote some of the songs for this album during spontaneous jams on the tour bus.

“We’re always playing,” she said. “Pedro Baby, for instance is always playing guitar; my other guitar player (Shimizu) – they are both playing all the time in the bus.”

Overall, the U.S. tour has been a positive experience for Bebel, despite a rainy opening on the East Coast. Bebel talked about audiences’ being generally responsive, from sober concert hall-goers where “couples cuddle” to festival audiences where people “dance and shake their butts.” She finds it heartening that so many of her shows are selling out. But the most important thing, she notes, is that she is surrounded by friends.

“We all like each other. We all hang out with each other. We all love each other,” Bebel said about her six-piece band. “And I think that comes across (to audiences).”

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