This holiday season, the Times-Picayune's Chris Waddington is happy to do without yet another mall-music listen to "Jingle Bell Rock." He's listening instead to Sérgio and Odair Assad's new album, Jardim Abandonado, and has added it to his list of gifts to give.
This holiday season, the Times-Picayune's Chris Waddington is happy to do without yet another mall-music listen to "Jingle Bell Rock." He's listening instead to Sérgio and Odair Assad's new album, Jardim Abandonado, and has added it to his list of gifts to give.
"For the better part of a century," Waddington writes, "Brazilian musicians have been gracefully blending the sounds of Europe, Africa and the Americas. The Assad brothers are no exception." They do just that on their new record, bringing together a diverse array of composers, from Gershwin to Debussy to Jobim as only the Assads can do:Full of flickering runs, lush chords and ringing harmonics, these vividly recorded performances are a delight for guitar aficionados. They also display the arranging talents of Sergio Assad, whose transcription of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" evokes all the colors and sonic weight of the original orchestration in 15 minutes of guitar pyrotechnics.
Read Chris Waddington's complete holiday "short list" at nola.com.
You can hear excerpts of the Assads' performance of "Rhapsody in Blue" as well as complete tracks from Jardim Abandonado by clicking here.
