♪ OBITUARY – Nobody could imagine what would happen when Astrud Evangelina Weinert (March 29, 1940 – June 5, 2023) entered the A&R Recording studio in New York (USA), on March 18 or 19, 1963, to record the English samba version Girl from Ipanema almost by chance, without having been informed beforehand by João Gilberto (1931 – 2019).

50 years later, everyone knows that the recording of The girl from Ipanema – the title of which was literally translated into English in Norman Gimbel’s version (1927 – 2018) – was the trigger that sparked the worldwide explosion of Bossa Nova when it was released in March 1964 on the album Getz / Gilberto.

It’s no exaggeration to say that Astrud – at the time married to João Gilberto, author of The Idea of ​​Trusting Girl from Ipanema to the song of the artist – it was the voice of bossa nova on a planetary scale. A cool broadcast voice that has spanned generations and become one of the most influential in the world, a benchmark for current youth idols like singer Billie Eilish.

As the successor to Julie London (1926 – 2000), an American singer who influenced future bossa nova artists with the album Julie is her name (1955), Astrud built a respected discography in the world of Latin jazz, far from the spotlight that shelters celebrities, becoming a sort of Greta Garbo (1905 – 1990) of bossa.

However, in fact, nothing surpassed the fact that she was the voice of record of the year at the 1965 Grammys). This is why today all the obituaries of Astrud Gilberto will highlight in the title that the singer from Bahia – born in Salvador (BA), daughter of a German father and a Brazilian mother, and deceased yesterday at the age of 83, in Philadelphia (USA), of cause not informed by the family – for having popularized on the planet the samba composed in 1962 by Antonio Carlos Jobim (1927 – 1994) and Vinicius de Moraes (1913 – 1980). The samba presented by the authors on August 2 of this year 1962, on the stage of the Rio Au Bon Gourmet nightclub, during the premiere of Um Encontro, a historical show that brought together Tom, Vinicius, João Gilberto and the group Os Cariocas .

Married to João Gilberto from 1959 to 1964, Astrud Gilberto made her debut as a singer in another emblematic show, The night of love, smiles and flowerscollective event presented in 1960 at the amphitheater of the Faculty of Architecture of the city of Rio de Janeiro (RJ), cradle of Bossa Nova.

The singer’s unwitting international career began in 1963 when Astrud emigrated to the United States with João. In addition to Garota de Ipanema, Astrud was the most famous voice of the English version of Corcovado (Antonio Carlos Jobim, 1963), written by Canadian Gene Lees (1928 – 2010), titled Quiet nights of quiet stars and released on the same 1964 album recorded by João Gilberto with American jazz saxophonist Stan Getz (1927 – 1991).

On the heels of the phenomenal success of this defining record, Astrud – nominated (without winning) for the 1965 Grammy Revelation of the year – recorded and released his own album in 1965. Astrud Gilberto’s album (1965) already indicated that, this time, the singer was the protagonist, not the supporting actor who stole the stage from João and Getz in the 1964 album. Astrud made his solo discography debut with a album that was not Antonio Carlos Jobim’s songbook only because a song by Dorival Caymmi (1914 – 2008) was in the repertoire.

Before announcing her retirement from the stage in 2002, the reclusive Astrud had recorded 16 other albums in which she also performed as a composer without ever failing to give voice to the songs of the main authors of bossa nova and direct descendants. or indirect such as Paulo Jobim and Ronaldo baguettes.

Even on a smaller scale, records like I have nothing better to do (1970), Astrud Gilberto now (1972) and Astrud Gilberto and James Last Orchestra (1986) helped amp up a cool, stylish song that brought together famous followers such as Sade and the aforementioned Bille Eilish.

Great jazz musicians have recorded with the idolized singer in Japan. Brazil, on the other hand, seemed unaware of Astrud’s path. included in International Latin Music Hall of Fame of the United States and winner of the award Latin Jazz USA Lifetime Achievement Award in 1992, ten years before completing the discography with the album Jungle (2002), Astrud does not seem to have wanted to salute Brazil either.

And it is clear that, except in niches worshiping bossa nova, the death of Astrud Evangelina Weinert will resonate with the discretion that seems to have guided the artistic trajectory of the Brazilian singer who sold the most records in the world.