Lincoln Center Festival will present irrepressible Brazilian artist Tom Zé returns to New York after 12 years with "Studying Tom Zé," featuring songs from the celebrated series of albums Estudando o Samba, Estudando o Pagode, and most recently Estudando a Bossa. Eccentric and enigmatic, a typical Tom Zé show is part musical performance, part comedy, and part lecture on subjects ranging from the history of counterpoint to the pitfalls of globalization. In his words, "I don't make art; I make spoken and sung journalism."
Described by The New York Times as "one of Brazil's most idiosyncratic performers, a pop innovator who bypasses the ordinary," Tom Zé's appearance in the pop world seemed like a small miracle in the way it defied all expectations of what Brazilian music should sound like. Having come from two distinct, yet interconnected worlds-the traditional and the modern-much of Zé's artistic production over the past five decades is informed by the tension between two realities. He is a brash intellectual, simultaneously co-opting traditional forms and themes of Brazilian music, sometimes performing his compositions with self-invented instruments.
Originally recorded in 1973, the first of Tom's "Studies" albums, Estudando o Samba is among the most influential albums of experimental pop in Brazil. Conceived as an extended study of various forms of samba with complex vocal and instrumental arrangements, Tom Zé's music reveals the quirky composer's unorthodox approach to melody and instrumentation, as well as his love for unresolved paradoxes in lyrics, such as "You invent love/I invent solitude," and "I'm explaining things to confuse you/I'm confusing you to clarify." Combining samba, Bossa Nova, Brazilian folk music, forró, and American rock and roll, Zé's unique sound has been praised by avant-garde composers for its dissonance, polytonality, and unusual time signatures. Because of the experimental nature of many of his compositions, Zé is often compared to
Frank Zappa - both musicians are known for being wildly original, subversive, and unexpectedly important.
Influential in the Tropicália movement of the 1960s, Tom Zé, along with Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Gal Costa, and Os Mutantes contributed to the watershed album/manifesto Tropicália: ou Panis et Circenses. After the Brazilian military cracked down on the musicians of Tropicália, Zé moved out of the public eye and began to experiment with novel instruments and composition styles. While other major Tropicália figures would go on to commercial and critical success in later decades, Zé slipped into obscurity in the 1970s.
Since
David Byrne rediscovered him in the 1990 and made him the first artist signed to his Luaka Bop label, Zé has performed in New York three times: once in Central Park, once in the mid-90s at the Museum of Modern Art and the last time in 1999 with the Chicago Post Rock band Tortoise as his backing band. He has appeared at festivals in Canada (Vancouver, Montreal, Edmonton, Saskatoon) and England (London International Festival of Theatre at Queen Elizabeth Hall). His recent recordings include two major collaborations with the acclaimed modern dance company Grupo Corpo. In 2010, Luaka Bop released a vinyl-only box set, Studies of Tom Zé: Explaining Things So I Can Confuse You which pulls together for the first time the trilogy of "studies" on Brazilian musical styles-Estudando o Samba, Estudando o Pagode. Cut in 180-gram vinyl, and in their complete original covers, the three-record set also includes a live 45 of Zé's legendary collaborative tour with Tortoise, recorded at London's Barbican in 2001. Luaka Bop simultaneously released Estuando a Bossa, hailed in many 2010 year-end charts as one of the best 'world' music records of the year.
Tickets are $45 and $60 and can be purchased online at
LincolnCenterFestival.org, by phone at 212.721.6500, or at the Alice Tully Hall or Avery Fisher Hall box offices.
