CD Release

A História do Choro

Rogério Souza, Edinho Gerber, Ami Molinelli

https://duoviolaoplus1.bandcamp.com/releases

Guitarists Rogério Souza, one of the foremost representatives of the music of Rio de Janeiro and pioneer of the Choro Novo style, and Edinho Gerber, a multi-cultural and genre crossing artist, have performed together over the last five years as Duo Violão and developed a truly unique sound and approach to performing the music of their home country. 2019 marks the release of their first album, A História do Choro, where the duo joined forces with Ami Molinelli, one of the preeminent American pandeiro players and percussion virtuosos, to create Duo Violão + 1.

“A História do Choro, their first recorded collaboration, guitarists Rogério Souza, and Edinho Gerber, alongside percussionist Ami Molinelli, survey the musical history and evolution of Choro, revealing its rhythmic and harmonic permutations and, in the process, create an album that is coherent in timbre and vision while marvelously varied in its nuances.”

-Professor Bryan McCann, Georgetown University

The album, funded by the San Francisco Arts Commission, presents Choro’s history in three blocks: the first representing the foundational block of the late 19th century through the first decade of the 20th century; the second representing the intermediate range of the music from 1910 through 1940; and the third representing the modern range from the 1940s through to the present day. Selections by composers such as Chiquinha Gonzaga, Pixinguinha, Heitor Villa-Lobos, and Jacob do Bandolim are here performed alongside an original composition by Souza and another by Molinelli and Gerber. 

Their lively performances expand on the Choro-centric repertoire from the album and explore the wealth of styles of Brazilian instrumental music from Baião to Samba to Bossa Nova. While always approaching the best of Brazilian popular music with fresh and unique perspectives, the group showcases original works and inventive arrangements.

Their in-depth and interactive workshop, developed over many years and presented at universities like Yale, Oberlin, University of Southern California, Berklee, Lawrence, Syracuse, San Francisco State, James Madison, Temple, Georgetown, CalState LA, among others, covers the rhythms and musical genres that helped Choro become the greatest artform from Brazil. From the pre-choro style, Lundu, through Tango-Habanera, Polka, Maxixe and culminating with Modern Choro and Choro-Samba, the group traces the evolution of the music in a clear and effective way while giving a real sense of its cultural impact and musical reverberations it created throughout the world.