 What The Press Is Saying About Maucha Adnet & Helio Alves « Milagre »
★★★★ DownBeat Magazine
Maucha Adnet’s third album as a leader groups together a number of Brazilian jazz tunes, pairs her with longtime collaborator Helio Alves and lets the duets speak for themselves. Milagre presents a jazz vocalist at the height of her powers supported by a superlative soloist and encouraging accompanist. The two seem at home together, with Adnet’s deep alto dancing lightly over Alves’ precise rubato rhythms. The two give intimate, superb performances of compositions penned by Antônio Carlos Jobim, Gilberto Gil and other masters. Adnet picked up her innate understanding of the music while touring with Jobim for more than a decade, and her close study and countless performances are stamped on each tune. “Waters Of March” stands out as one of the only English tunes on the disc but is also notable for the casual ease of tempo. The tune’s accompaniment skips along, never rushing, and Adnet is able to lay on the back of the beat, nearly creating a rhythmic tension that makes the song one of the best on the record. The two also perform lesser-known numbers, such as the playful “April Child” and the breezy title tune. They seem to work best at a fast clip of a tempo, and the disc is full of uptempo, danceable music, but ballads like “Desafinada” are also beautiful in their slower pace.
—Jon Ross DownBeat Magazine
Individually, vocalist Maucha Adnet and pianist Helio Alves boast impressive résumés. She has collaborated with Charlie Byrd, Dori Caymmi, Eliane Elias, Gilberto Gil and Toninho Horta, and spent a decade touring and recording with Antonio Carlos Jobim. He’s partnered with an equally illustrious assortment of artists, including Yo-Yo Ma, Joe Henderson and Paquito D’Rivera. But the two Brazilians’ finest performances, spanning two decades, have been side-by-side.
Now, at long last, Adnet and Alves have united for an album, a 14-track compendium that captures a kinship that is the musical equivalent of water and air: distinct yet vitally interdependent. Alves is the sun-dappled sea, alternately roiling and calm but consistently deep, powerful and mysterious. Adnet is the vast sky, sometimes cloudy and occasionally stormy.
Together they strip bare both familiar gems (Caymmi’s “O Cantador,” Jobim’s “Caminhos Cruzados” and the near-century-old “Tico-Tico no Fubá”) and lesser-known classics (notably the Jobim film theme “Gabriela” and Edu Lobo and Vinicius de Moraes’ mournful “Canto Triste”), fully restoring their raw beauty. While Alves never falters, Adnet does stumble once. In the liner notes she admits to being somewhat challenged by the idea of singing “Waters of March” in English, and her discomfort shows. How much better, and truer to the spirit of the album, if she’d kept to Jobim’s original Portuguese lyric.
– Christopher Loudon JazzTimes
“…Maucha Adnet permeates the air with her velvety, warm, and passionate voice full of incomparable diction and unique pitch. Her masterful way of pausing and continuing with whispers can move anybody´s heart, reaching an intimate and soft point in her singing…” – Chip Boaz Latinjazznet
Adnet’s voice is transfixing, and Alves consistently draws you in with his imaginative pianism. This is an album to be listened to many times with additional nuances being discovered each time the music is revisited. – Joe Lang Jersey Jazz
Brazilian music in the right hands is magical. Maucha Adnet and Helio Alves have the right hands. – Jack Goodstein Blogcritics.com
Milagre is recorded with such intimate clarity that it seems the performance is happening live, and right in front of the listener. Wonderful!
DR. JUDITH SCHLESINGER Allaboutjazz.com
This album, from artists who know how to celebrate life with their music, should be savored. – Marcia Hillman The New York City Jazz Record
Milagre is about living life to the fullest, pulling that last once of joy from our soul as we transcend our own personal pain to embrace the healing power within this glorious music. – Brent Black @Critical Jazz
Magic is in the air on this disk. I revel in it. If you like classic samba-bossa song, this duet will send you! – Greg Edwards Gapplegate Music Review
Adnet and Alves have such an easy way with one another throughout this date so, given their close musical proximity over the years; it’s surprising that it took this long for them to get together sans company. Milagre is a long overdue treat. – DAN BILAWSKY Allaboutjazz.com
In which this duo delivers on what the power of two means. With just voice and piano, we are reminded the Adnet family has too much of concentration of talent and that Alves is a swinging jazzbo that can play anything any way it’s requested. A duo can only light so much fireworks but be assured that none of the fireworks in their bag are duds. Keeping the song stack full of recognizable classics, even of they do them up in ways you aren’t familiar with, this is a smoking recital that’ll keep you rapt throughout. Killer stuff. – CHRIS SPECTOR, Editor and Publisher Midwes Record
…fourteen classics from their native Brazil. Maucha’s voice is packed with emotion and bathed in the full-bodied presentation by Alves. We liked the vibrant « Gabriela » and the bouncy title track. – D. Oscar Groomes O’s Place Jazz Magazine
This CD showcases the lovely Brazilian vocalist, Maucha Adnet, a renowned and authentic Jobim afiçionada, and the equally renowned Brazilian pianist, Helio Alves. The duo brings to the lucky listener a collection of 14 elegantly presented songs, of varying rhythms and temperaments.
– Dr. Roberta E. Zlokower Roberta On The Arts
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