Esperança

Lisa Ono is truly an anomaly on the bossa nova scene. She is Japanese, though she was born in Brazil and raised there until she was ten. In addition, her father was Baden Powell's manager. When her family returned to Japan, her father owned a nightclub that hosted all of the traveling Brazilian musical emissaries, who taught her the repertory. But that was long ago. This 1994 release offers Ono in a new bossa setting that she makes her own. Her material is exceptional, made more so by her lilting, unmistakable voice. She is joined here by some top Brazilian session musicians, including Zeca Assumpcao, Cristovao Bastos, Paulo Moura, Danilo Caymmi, and Tom Jobim. The company she keeps is due to the quality of the material she performs and her manner of delivery: over half the material here is of her own design and origin. Elsewhere she performs the work of Jobim on "Estrada Branca," Jose Paulo Aouila on "A Gafiera," and the team of Angela Suarez and Paulo Pinheiro on "O Que É Que O Samba Tem." Ono's own "Bolero Cançao" and "Praia Nova" are also standout cuts. But perhaps the most beautiful track on this set is the opener, the collaboration between Ono and Paulo Cesar Pinheiro, "Samba de Enredo," with her staggering guitar work underlying a simmering rhythm. This samba twists and turns around the vocal rather than vice versa, and offers the listener a series of vocal and instrumental acrobatics. This is as fine a new bossa record as there is — head and shoulders above most. Ono is a treasure both in Japan and Brazil.