Egberto Gismonti
b. 5 December 1947, Carmo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Gismonti had a classical musical education starting to play the piano when he was six years old. He went to Paris in the '60s to study orchestration and analysis with Nadia Boulanger and composition with the avant garde composer Barraque. On his return to Brazil in 1966 he became interested in choro, which he has described as a kind of popular Brazilian funk. Gismonti successfully blends African -Brazilian forms with jazz in his compositions. He taught himself the guitar and was at first influenced by Baden Powell and Deno. His influences during the early '70s were as wide ranging as Django Reinhardt and Jimi Hendrix. In 1973 he changed to the 8-string guitar which allowed him a greater variety of chord voicings, more flexible bass lines and drones: in 1981 he moved on to the 10-string guitar on which the extra strings extended the bass. His performances on either piano or guitar are always exhilarating and tuneful. He toured the USA in 1976 with Airto Moreira and Flora Purim and in 1978/9 with Nana Vasconcelos. Gismonti's compositional and playing styles were influenced by his study in 1976 of the music of Xingu Indians. He described the resulting album as ‘a walk through the jungle’. His evocative writing and playing has been used in at least 11 film scores. He has recorded regularly with members of the ECM label, Jan Garbarek, Collin Walcott, Ralph Towner, Charlie Haden, and was the orchestrator on Vasconcelos's Suadedos with the Stuttgart RSO.