Silvia Telles – Amor de gente moça (1959)

Silvia Telles
“Amor de gente moça — músicas de Antonio Carlos Jobim”Odeon Fonográfica
MOFB 3084
This remaster, 2007

01 – Dindi (Tom Jobim / Aloysio de Oliveira)
02 – De Você Eu Gosto (Tom Jobim / Aloysio de Oliveira)
03 – Discussão (Tom Jobim / Newton Mendonça)
04 – Sem Você (Tom Jobim / Vinicius de Moraes)
05 – Fotografia (Tom Jobim)
06 – Janelas Abertas (Tom Jobim / Vinicius de Moraes)
07 – Demais (Tom Jobim / Aloysio de Oliveira)
08 – O Que Tinha de Ser (Tom Jobim / Vinicius de Moraes)
09 – A Felicidade (Tom Jobim / Vinicius de Moraes)
10 – Canta Canta Mais (Tom Jobim / Vinicius de Moraes)
11 – Só Em Teus Braços (Tom Jobim)
12 – Esquecendo Você (Tom Jobim)

Free translation from the original back cover notes:
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Three strong ingredients make up this LP:

The interpretation and singing of Silvia Telles.
The Music of Antonio Carlos Jobim.
The arrangements of Gaya.

Gaya demonstrates more and more with every effort a perfect understanding of the simplicity with which an orchestra must create a background for a singer.

Antonio Carlos Jobim, here with nine first-rate offerings, continues to prove his talent as the best composer of popular music today. And only Silvinha can give life to these songs.

Silvinha has already surpassed the phase of being only a singer. From this album onward we can call her a grand artist, a grand interpreter.

——————————————-

Silvia Telles’ short life was a condensation of the pathos and tragedy of musical legends. Although Nara Leão may have been “the muse of Bossa Nova,” Silvia Telles was really the genre’s first real interpreter. (I am discounting Elizeth Cardoso’s “Canção de Amor Demais”, which João Gilberto apparently found repugnant due to Elizete’s strident and brash vocal style which was thought to be very un-bossa nova). She was discovered by Billy Blanco at a young age, and dated João Gilberto as her first boyfriend (a relationship that ended because Silvia’s parents didn’t approve of João’s bohemian lifestyle and lack of a permanent address or steady job). Although her career began in 1955 and included performances along side Dick Farney and Dolores Doran, Silvia was one of the earliest people to record Jobim’s music and eventually became the headlining main act at the first ever concert promoted with “bossa nova” on the flier — a term bequeathed by an anonymous typist or secretary whose identity has never been discovered. Silvia was hugely important to the early history of bossa nova. Recording with other early pioneers like Luiz Bonfa and Lucio Alvez, she became one of the biggest stars on the Elenco label,eventually marrying founder Aloysio de Oliveira, and being one of the first bossa nova artists to perform in the United States and Europe. Her life was tragically cut short when she was killed in a car accident in 1966. She was thirty-two years old.

This is a classic statement in the bossa nova canon, allegedly the first album to consist entirely of compositions in the genre. By which is meant, I believe, that other records by founders such as João Gilberto drew from a diverse repertoire such as classic samba which he then turned *into* bossa nova. The album consists entirely of Tom Jobim compositions, many of which are appearing for the first time here. Although it may be hard for listeners to notice it 50 years after its release, Silvia’s singing was quite innovative in its day, a departure from the more dramatic styles that had been popular in past years. The album opens with “Dindi”, a song covered so many times I won’t even try to list them here. I once debated with myself whether Maysa’s version, recorded a year or so after this one, was superior, but finally decided that Silvia is more true to the spirit of it. Maysa certainly had the pain and suffering in her voice, drawn from the ample amounts of it in her life, but her style still veered towards the dramatic. Silvia was understated and subtle — those qualities that no doubt drew João Gilberto to her immediately. The album is so mellow and soothing that it may pass through your aural cavities without too much notice on the first few listens, or drift on the breeze with that stigmatized tag of “easy listening,” only revealing its nuances with subsequent replays. Check out the instrumental break in ‘Demais’ if you have any doubts, doubling the tempo until Silvia sings half a verse and it winds back down again right in the middle of it! No singers did that kind of thing in Brazilian music in the 1950s! This is the kind of musical modernity that was practically ‘scandalous’ at the time. Remember that, like the title says, this record is music for young lovers. It was also an injection of energy and inspiration to other singers who realized they had to contend with Silvia’s power. It’s no coincidence that Maysa, for example, recorded her own bossa nova album a year later with a nascent Tamba Trio, showing that she too could kick it with the jazz-inflected vocal phrasings. Although her career spanned a little over a decade, it’s been somewhat eclipsed by the prominence of those bossa nova stars whose luminosity, one could argue, owed everything to Silvia’s pioneering work.

Silvia Telles – Amor de gente moça (1959) in 320 kbs em pe three

Silvia Telles – Amor de gente moça (1959) in FLAC LOSSLESS AUDIO

Full artwork, log, cue, m3u, and a bottle of cognac included.

For those interested there is also a vinyl rip of this album from an original pressing over at Loronix.

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