Brasil Maior Vol 1: Various Artists, 1980

This might be the first compilation on the blog. It's a collection of Brazilian music that's not 100% essential listening, but it includes some really nice tracks, especially on the second side. My favorite is Ela Desatinou, written by Chico Buarque and performed by Nara Leão. The song was originally released in 1980 on Leão's album Com Açúcar, Com Afeto. In the middle of the 70's, she had left the music world altogether to focus on her family and study psychology. She had already started recording again when she learned that she had inoperable brain cancer in 1979, and in the subsequent 10 years before her death she was incredibly prolific.

The beauty of this song caught my attention right away, and when I learned that she recorded it a year after receiving her diagnosis, I was inspired. It was not the strength of her spirit in the face of death so much as the way that she was able to take control of her creative impulse and produce not only an incredible quantity of music, but a song this beautiful to top it off. I don't have much more to say than that Leão is a beautiful example of the endless creative potential that people possess. It's amazing to witness the incredible feats, artistic and otherwise, that great people manage.

Ela Desatinou by Easy Jams