Gal Costa: "Brazil needs elegance and purity"

Singer Gal Costa, in an image from 2018 Folhapress

Gal Costa (Salvador, 75 years old) has been attentive to the reality show

Big Brother Brazil

in recent days.

Last Tuesday, a day of elimination in which some participants are thrown out of the house they share, the possible departure of two participants, Gil and Juliette (who was especially criticized by their opponents), had her expectantly.

In the end, the two protagonists were saved and remained in the program thanks to the public who, like the singer from Bahia, supported them.

“I defend Juliette, who is from Northeast Brazil.

I know the prejudices they have with us, with our accent.

They are always laughing at how she talks, ”says Gal Costa, using her own accent to reinforce her identity as a daughter of that region of Brazil.

The singer regrets the environment of prejudice and psychological violence that she perceives in programs like

Big Brother

.

"It is a mirror of current times, in Brazil and in the world," he says.

It is in the face of these times that the singer released last Friday the album

Nenhuma dor

(

Without pain,

in Spanish), which brings together 10 duets released as singles in recent months, with artists such as Seu Jorge, Criolo, Rodrigo Amarante, Zé Ibarra , Rubel, Silva, Tim Bernardes, Zeca Veloso, the Uruguayan Jorge Drexler and the Portuguese António Zambujo.

All the tracks are new versions of songs recorded by Costa between 1967 and 1981, a period in which Brazil lived under a military dictatorship.

Costa believes that, despite the decades that have passed, those songs still have a lot to teach Brazil that is reflected in shows like

Big Brother

.

"It is important that these songs are heard, because it seems that people do not change," says the singer.

“They remain the same, the militancy, the inconstancy, the lack of a more open vision of respect for others, for differences.

All this is now evidenced by digital media.

There is a lot of poison, a lot of evil.

People are too tense, too vigilant, everyone watches and condemns everyone.

Brazil needs elegance and purity ”.

Elegance and purity are, to a certain extent, the aesthetic proposal of

Nenhuma dor

.

With an economy of elements, songs are reduced to their essence.

The basis of all of them are the violins and violas of Felipe Pacheco Ventura (also responsible for the string arrangements) and the cellos of Marcus Ribeiro.

The process has been determined by the pandemic: each guest has sent a recording of their voice and, in many cases, one or another instrument.

From there, Gal Costa recorded his own song.

The singer was surprised when Marcus Preto, the album's artistic director, drew her attention to the fact that her singing had influenced not only the singers who came after her, but also the men, as the cast exclusively demonstrates. male of

Nenhuma dor.

“When I heard Tim Bernardes singing, I realized that he was making some inflections that are my way of singing, which were not originally in the composition,” explains Costa.

“Marcus told me that not only him, but also many male singers have been very influenced by my voice.

I was greatly influenced by a man, who is João Gilberto.

Now I'm filming with men who were influenced by me.

That's beautiful, ”he says.

The homage tone runs through the album.

The new recordings are reverent to Costa, despite bringing the stylistic marks of the guests and a contemporary approach.

Some achieve more surprising results, such as that of Seu Jorge for

Juventude transfixed

(due to his deep voice, two octaves below the singer, or “in the basement”, as she says), that of Bernardes for

Baby

(due to the delicacy crystalline of the arrangement signed by him, including the strings) or that of Amarante for

Avarandado

(for its elegantly pop freshness).

Nenhuma dor

is full of memories that cover fundamental moments in the Bahian's career, such as the

Tropicália

and the

Gal Tropical

phase

- originally, the name of the album was

Gal 75

, in reference to the 75th birthday of the singer that the project celebrates.

The start of Costa's career is of special importance for this production.

His debut album,

Domingo

(1967), which he shared with Caetano Veloso, is rescued in three songs:

Coração vagabundo

(in duet with Rubel),

Avarandado

(with Amarante) and

Nenhuma dor

(with Zeca Veloso, the composer's son).

Caetano, by the way, is the author of seven of the ten songs on the album.

"

Sunday

was the beginning of the beginning," recalls Costa.

“Caetano and I used to get up very early to go to the studio and I always slept very late, I still do today.

It was difficult to get up to record ”.

The album also features songs by Luiz Melodia, Tom Jobim and Chico Buarque and Dorival Caymmi (“Só louco”).

The singer especially likes her voice in the new version of

Só louco,

a song by Caymmi.

“I think my performance as a singer is better on this recording than on the first [

Gal Canta Caymmi

album

, 1976].

The strings served as inspiration for some elongated notes that I make and that I really liked ”, he says.

Gal Costa eagerly awaits his return to the stage and has already started talking to Preto about a new show.

but respecting the time of the pandemic.

“I'm a homebody, but staying home out of obligation is something else.

I follow science, I want to protect myself and others, so I stay home.

But I want to put on a show as soon as this is all over.

We have some ideas, ”he says.

“Today I see everything I did in the past, exposing the body, the legs, putting everything that was prohibited in the heads of the people, by the Government.

I did it spontaneously and with a certain ingenuity.

I was spontaneously free.

I see elegance and purity in these images of mine ”.

These images that Costa, in

Nenhuma dor

, gently projects onto Brazil, and onto Big Brother Brazil that reflects it.

"Any song, almost nothing / will make the sun rise / will make the day rise," he sings in "Avarandado."