LOS ANGELES (Marisa Monte Official Website) -
Marisa Monte has announced her first U.S. tour dates since 2000. The Brazilian superstar will embark on a four-city tour this November in support of the U.S. release of her two new albums, Universo ao meu redor and Infinito Particular. Monte's irrepressible 10-piece band will be making stops in the following cities:
MARISA MONTE - U.S. TOUR DATES
4-Nov - San Francisco - Palace of Fine Arts Theater (SF Jazz)
8-Nov - Los Angeles - Royce Hall (UCLA)
10-Nov - Miami - Gusman Center for the Performing Arts
14-Nov - New York - Beacon Theater
Metro Blue also plans an extensive digital release rollout to begin in mid-June. On June 20, Monte's full catalog will be available digitally for the first time ever, with the exclusive iTunes Music Store release of Marisa Monte, Mais, Cor De Rosa E Carvao (Rose And Charcoal), Barulhinho Bom (A Great Noise), and Memorias Cronicas E Declaracoes (Memories, Chronicles and Declarations). All other digital retail outlets will release Monte's catalog titles on June 27.
Metro Blue will then introduce a single from each of Monte's new albums-"O Bonde do Dom" from Universo ao meu redor and "Vilarejo" from Infinito Particular-as exclusive digital releases on the iTunes Music Store on July 11, with all other digital retail outlets releasing the two singles on July 18. The two full albums will be available at all digital retailers on August 1, before the CDs physical release date in stores on September 12.
Universo ao meu redor (The Universe Around Me), co-produced by Monte and Mario Caldato, is her first-ever recording to focus entirely on the great Brazilian tradition of Samba. Having grown up immersed in Samba (her father Carlos was one of the directors of the famous Portela Samba school in Rio de Janeiro), Monte was aware that there were many songs that were passed along orally that weren't being recorded and were in danger of being lost. So she began researching these songs and their histories by interviewing Samba composers, as well as their family members & colleagues.
Universo ao meu redor places several of her discoveries that date back as far as the 1940s, including songs by Jayme Silva, D. Yvonne Lara, Casemiro Vieira, Moraes e Galvao, and Argemiro Patrocinio, alongside new Samba songs written by Monte with Brown and Antunes and other contemporary composers such as Paulinho da Viola. Ex-Talking Heads frontman David Byrne also makes a guest appearance on the song "Statue of Liberty," which he co-wrote with Monte.
During the same time that Monte was doing her Samba research, she also began to sort through her large collection of cassette tapes on which she had documented her songwriting process from the beginning of her career. As she went through the hundreds of tapes, digitizing them for preservation, she came across the early sketches of songs that had since been recorded and made popular, but also many songs that she had abandoned and not yet returned to finish.
This inspired Monte, along with songwriting partners both old (Brown, Antunes, Nando Reis, Pedro Baby, and Dadi) and new (Seu Jorge, Adriana Calcanhotto, Marcelo Yuka, Leonardo Reis and Rodrigo Campelo), to readdress some of this unfinished material and bring it to life. The result is the 13 tracks on Infinito Particular (Infinite Private), which was co-produced by Monte and Alê Siqueira, and also features arrangements by Eumir Deodato, João Donato, and the renowned American Classical composer Philip Glass.
Marisa Monte was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1967. Her father, Carlos Monte, was one of the directors of the Portela Samba school, and she begin her musical studies, including piano, drums & music theory, at a very early age. Despite coming of age during the height of the Musica Popular Brasileira movement-MPB was the post-bossa nova popular music of Brazil-Monte's first interest was in Classical music and Opera, and so inspired by her idol Maria Callas she traveled to Italy at age 18 to study Classical singing.
It was while abroad that Monte first fully recognized the musical richness of her homeland, and decided to return to Brazil and join the ranks of the MPB, following in the footsteps of her greatest influences, including Elis Regina, Gal Costa, Jorge Ben, Caetano Veloso, Nara Leão and Maria Bethânia, and establishing herself as a star in her own right.
Monte's self-titled debut album in 1989 was an instant hit in Brazil, with stunning interpretations of everything from Gershwin and Kurt Weill to Brazilian pop, R&B and an old Carmen Miranda tune. One of her biggest fans, New York City-based guitarist Arto Lindsay, then took on a mentor's role, helping her craft a string of critically acclaimed international releases that further explored her eclectic and original vision. Mais (1991), Rose And Charcoal (1994), A Great Noise (1996), and Memories, Chronicles and Declarations (2000), as well as Tribalistas (2003), her successful collaboration with Carlinhos Brown and Arnaldo Antunes have introduced Monte to a growing global audience.
