Astrud Gilberto spread bossa nova to a welcoming world – but got little love back in Brazil
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(THE CONVERSATION) Astrud Gilberto didn’t set out to be an ambassador of bossa nova, the laid-back Brazilian musical genre with rhythms recognizable to music lovers around the world.
According to Gilberto, who died on June 5, 2023, at the age of 83, she wasn’t expecting to be on the 1964 recording of “The Girl from Ipanema” – the song for which she is best remembered.
At the time of the recording, she wasn’t even a professional singer.
But Gilberto’s breathy singing voice – almost a whisper, with no hint of a vibrato – helped catapult the song, the singer and bossa nova to the forefront of international pop music.
But while she went on to achieve global fame, back home in Brazil, Gilberto was never given the respect that I believe her talent deserved. In 1966, in the only major performance she gave in her home country, she was booed.
When bossa went big
Astrud Gilberto and “The Girl from Ipanema” marked a turning point in bossa nova.
The genre had appeared in Rio de Janeiro in 1958, when João Gilberto invented a new beat on his guitar out of...