Brazilian Music Friday Feature #22

This week's pick is Comichão, played by Spok Frevo Orquestra, and written by Jovino Santos Neto (who I've also featured here). It's a frevo, energetic marching band carnival music from Recife, the capital of Pernambuco State in the northeast of Brazil. The word frevo derives from the verb ferver, meaning "to boil" in Portuguese, which makes sense with the frenetic pace of this style. Spok Frevo Orquestra is unique because it fuses traditional frevo with jazz big band instrumentation and improvisation (something that frevo musicians don't do much), but they also highlight traditional composers of frevo, which hasn't become as famous outside of its region of origin as, say, samba. I got to participate in Spok's ensembles at California Brazil Camp during the summer of 2015, and his arrangements are both intriguing and difficult, but really fun to play!

If you're inspired to listen to more frevo, the latest episode of the excellent Caipirinha Appreciation Society podcast is devoted to it. Their tagline is "Brazilian music beyond the clichés", and they definitely live up to that, with 400 2-hour episodes so far - one of my favorite music podcasts!

Enjoy the song, and your weekend!