Villela Opens Up On Life, Music, And Passion
10 Questions with Claudia Villela? The Brazilian American singer and songwriter reveals her thoughts on artistry – and life – in her own personable way.
By Scott Adams
One of life’s basic truths can be found in the preoccupations of dealing with the day-to-day. For instance, as we were setting up for our interview, Claudia Villela was struggling with a mold problem at home. “It’s a nightmare,” she said. “It’s a big problem!”
We’ve all been there, and when easy solutions are nowhere to be found, we improvise. As we found out during these 10 questions, that’s something that Claudia Villela does better than almost anyone. And in her case, it applies to music, as it applies to life. Enjoy!
10 Questions with Claudia Villela
You are a daughter of Rio. What was it like for you as a young adult growing up in a dynamic Brazilian music scene, from samba soul to fusion jazz and the beginning of MPB’s greatest era? Did you have an early interest as a singer in Rio de Janeiro?
I wasn’t exactly focused on music or singing at all, because ”it was there”, you know?
I didn’t have a guitar or a piano until I was 15, given to me by my Godmother. And I recall that the pianola that I got on my first birthday from my father was broken since I was five. It was tucked away under my grandfather’s bed and never played. It must have been tossed away for some reason. Sad I never could play it again.
The thing was I knew I could always sit at a piano and create something out of the blue.
When I would visit someone’s house that had a piano, I was drawn to it like a magnet. Just going with the flow, in the zone. That was a given.
I loved Astronomy and was planning to go to Medical School. And I loved drawing and writing stories, and poetry. I had not yet decided I would become a musician.
Growing Through Discovery
So, I made a musical discovery when I was about eight years old. During a theater performance at school, I started to improvise and… bam! It was magic! A dimension opened where I could be free, and I was hooked.
But at that point in my childhood, I wasn’t thinking that music would be my path. Eventually, it led me to college to study Music Therapy. It was a way to unite my passions for music and medicine.
I recall seeing Hermeto Pascoal perform when I was in High School. I knew a couple of the musicians in the band. They were playing wild and, caught up in the moment, I became wild myself!
Suddenly, I let out this incredible high note from the bottom of my being and Hermeto STOPPED the concert looking for who was doing that. Well, I was so shy back then, and I didn’t show myself. I guess maybe that would have changed my life right there.
Little did I know that years later Hermeto would bring me to sing on the stage of SFJAZZ in California and introduce me as a “genius musician” (oh, my heart!).
I sang and won many music festivals, and I met some of my all-time musician friends.
So, yeah, I was still going with the wind… I have a special memory of walking along sunny Ipanema beach with my longtime friend, Maucha Adnet. We talked and talked, not quite sure what we were doing with our lives.
I guess music chose us!
Setting Poetry To Music
How did the concept of Cartas Ao Vento come about? In 2017, you hinted at the idea of setting Latin American poetry to music, but the album also became a musical reunion for longtime friends. Tell me a story.
It was time. After all, I had recorded seven studio albums here: Nosso Abacaxi, Asa Verde, Supernova, Dream Tales (my completely improvised album with pianist Kenny Werner), Claudia Villela NPR Live at Kuumbwa (with Dori Caymmi), Inverse Universe, and Encantada Live, with Airto and Toots Thielemans, Michael Brecker, and Toninho Horta.
So, I decided to record an album with my friends in Rio.
I had songs written for a commission from NYU to create music for Latin American poetry. In doing my research I found that some of the pieces really resonated with me. In fact, ‘Flores do Mais’, ‘Instrumento’, and ‘Paramo’ became part of my repertoire. Ultimately, I decided they belonged on the album which became Cartas Ao Vento (Letters to the Wind).
I wrote the title song in 2004. ‘Agua Santa’ followed two years later, and then ‘Bolero’ in 2008. ‘Chorinho Pra Elas’ came to me in 2013.
I also had several older songs from the 80s and 90’s that I had written in Rio, including ‘Meninando’, ‘Chamego’, and ‘Batucador’. Just like chapters of a story, they belonged together.
The pandemic was challenging for us all. So, when the situation got better I decided it was time to come out of the funk. I thought, “I need to find a way to string these musical pearls like a lifeline. And it has to be laced from the cradle space, Rio.”
10 Questions with Claudia Villela: The Idea
I took that idea and called Mario Adnet to produce it. He’s a great musician and guitarist, and a friend since my teenage years, so I anxiously outlined my plans. I had so much in my mind!
Mario suggested two more old friends. One is percussionist/drummer Marcelo Costa who I know from high school at the Colégio Brasileiro de Almeida. Back then, Tom Jobim’s mom was the director.
In fact, Marcelo and I first met on the school’s stairs when he commented on my singing presentation a few days earlier. I was about 15 years old!
Rounding out the trio for Cartas Ao Vento is bassist Jorge Helder, who was my neighbor in Botafogo. Every once in a while, we’d bump into each other to say hello, and one day I just blurted out “you will record on my album some day!”
They’re all great musicians and I’m very honored for their participation in Cartas Ao Vento. Even more importantly, this all made sense to me. Like I was finding a treasure chest at the bottom of the sea.
We recorded – still wearing masks – in the studio in the Humaita neighborhood, right under the open arms of Corcovado and just a few blocks from my childhood home.
Toninho Horta and Romero Lubambo recorded remotely. Such masters and beloved friends they all are! We’ve all known each other a long, long time too.
Event:
- Claudia Villela performed live at Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society in Half Moon Bay, California on Mother’s Day, Sunday, May 12th. Watch for more events here!
Earning a degree in Music Therapy suggests a move away from what the future held for you. Then you moved to Santa Cruz. What inspired you to uproot your life and what musical influences did you bring with you?
My boyfriend in Rio was born in the USA (although his family is Brazilian) and he insisted that I fly to California to be with him. He became my husband and father of my daughters.
Looking back, I wouldn’t say I regret it since it made me who I am today. But yeah, if I had stayed in Rio my story would have been very different. It was really hard to leave.
I went to college in Rio to study Music Therapy and I worked a lot. I had my internships at hospitals.
But I love music, too. So, I also did a creative musical for children with “Ta Na Hora” at Rios’ Villa Lobos Theatre. I played many instruments, sang, and did all the sound effects as well. I liked that a lot too. However, I was so torn with the idea of leaving that I think I unconsciously sabotaged myself by breaking my foot onstage during a performance, dancing frevo there!
In addition to that, I did some modeling, and improvised vocals for movies by singing and creating spontaneously as I looked at the scenes. I recorded vocals for artists, including Vinicius Cantuaria, Elba Ramalho, and Mario Adnet. I also sang with the bands Piramad and Agata on alternative radio. The music was a twisted fusion of pop, rock, and jazz. It was really fun.
I participated and won prizes for best vocals at Medical School College Festivals in Valença, where I met some great artists who are still my friends. Looking back, it’s nice to think that I got to hang with the cats from A Barca do Sol (a big influence), Boca Livre, and Ceu da Boca since my high school days!
Claudia Villela’s Musical Influences
I didn’t pay much attention to Bossa Nova, but I loved Milton, Chico, Egberto, and Djavan. I love Bach, Satie, Debussy, and Villa Lobos. Same for Chick Corea and Pat Metheny who I adore! Do I have time for a story?
Well, one day Pat left a message on Kenny Werner’s phone saying how much he dug our all-improv album Dream Tales. Then he and Michael Brecker gave me two comp tickets for their concert at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center here in Santa Cruz. That was so thoughtful! I was in heaven, sitting right there in the front row with a pounding heart, so close to Pat… I almost fainted!
Interestingly, I also listened to lots of Rock and Pop on the radio. Led Zeppelin was my “stairway to heaven”, and I also loved the band Renaissance.
My musical influences are vast. They’ve always been all around me. My mom singing, my father’s harmonica, my grandfather whistling. Even the blind singer on the street corner, the maids singing louder and louder as they drank cachaça while they prepared food for parties at my grandmother’s house. Macumba! My stepfather would take me to the ceremonies, and I loved it, especially for the drumming, the ritual chants, and the rhythms, of course.
10 Questions with Claudia Villela
Interestingly, you joined a series of choirs and vocal ensembles. Did you view this as a starting point or as “starting over”?
A starting point if you’re talking about being here. But honestly, I felt like a Phoenix. You know, ashes to rebirth.
When I came to the US in 1984, I didn’t know anybody here besides my husband. I didn’t know how to drive. I didn’t know the language, even though my mom was a university English teacher. Everything seemed plastic and distant. It felt… cold!
I was eager to make music, make new contacts, and start a life here. It wasn’t easy. Going anywhere involved trains and buses. But then, I pulled on an old musical thread.
In Rio, I sang with the Pro Arte Choir and also with a Madrigal Choir during my Music Therapy years at the Conservatory, while working with autistic children and schizophrenic adults at hospitals. So, I joined the Stanford Chorus (we sang Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion), and later the De Anza College Jazz Singers.
I hope fans will enjoy our 10 questions with Claudia Villela. What’s the one thing that most people don’t know about you?
I’m the best grandmother!!!!
Spontaneous Improvisation
Your voice can recreate the sounds of nature or musical instruments. You improvise with spontaneity. Your lyrics carry indelible nuance. Where does all of this come from? I sense that it is something more than your pivotal time with Sheila Jordan.
Yeah, I love Sheila! She is such a light and inspiration, and she gets me. She once told me that I reminded her of another student of hers, Paula Cole.
I’m a mutt. I carry lots of memories, I’m romantic and nostalgic. And the more I dig, the more I find.
Much of my creativity comes from my maternal grandfather. I went to live with him in Botafogo after my parents divorced. He was a master at whistling and imitating animals. He once told me that his first gig as a teenager was at a radio station, doing all kinds of sounds for the background of live programs!
Music has always embraced me. My mom had a beautiful voice and loved to sing around the house. My father played the harmonica, and he constructed a sound system from scratch, where I would listen to Ray Conniff’s ‘Besame Mucho’. I remember my mom cried with joy when he first turned it on.
I still remember my grandfather’s big furniture radio, where I would sit to tune in radio stations from faraway lands. It was a treat! One night when I was 3, he steadied me on the top of the window of his apartment to see the Halley Comet. His enthusiasm made me fall in love with Astronomy. “It’s a spectacle!” he said.
Maybe it’s in the genes. My maternal great-grandfather was the master chef for Pedro II and he played the clarinet. I still have it.
Sounds:
Ambient Influences
Besides family inspiration, I have to add the powerful effect of ambiance. The sounds of the Escola de Samba wafting through the window, from the hills behind my grandmother’s house in Tijuca. I would fall asleep by its lullaby. Sometimes I could hear a classical pianist practicing from a nearby window.
Nature influences me always. The sound of burning palha benta (palm husks), believed to relieve the severity of thunderstorms. The beach vendors singing their ladainhas with the waves in the background, the wind through the high palm trees.
These synergies of so many memories, musical or not, are inseparable from what music is, for me.
When you are ready to take a break, what do you like to do? Do you have a hobby or some other kind of escape?
I love to cook! I water my plants, and I talk to them and to birds. And I planted a garden with 15 fruit trees and everything else in my backyard. I love to hike and swim. I’ve got to go back to doing yoga, once my knee lets me!
Active Listening
Would you please name your three favorite Jazz albums, and also your three all-time favorite Brazilian albums?
Jazz? Affinity– Bill Evans and Toots Thielemans, Mad Hatter – Chick Corea, and American Garage – Pat Metheny.
Brazilian? Primal Roots – Sergio Mendes, Sentinela – Milton Nascimento, and Circense – Egberto Gismonti.
There are so many, it’s hard to choose just three!
Sometimes, creativity can be fragile. Is there a different creative approach to being in the studio as opposed to being on the stage?
It depends on my mood. I love the wonderful interplay with tuned-in people from a welcoming live audience, especially if the sound is good. But I also really dig a studio session when all conditions are under control, with no rush …
Both are different spaces to connect and create. What I love is what comes out in the moment.
Musicians welcome moments of real connection with the divine and truth. Sometimes from mistakes, we break all the syntax, and the poetry is live! We are really able to touch people and eternity, fulfill our mission to create new meanings, and make our existence a bit more beautiful.
I’m looking into having a home studio as a lab. I really wish I had one already, for all these years I poured music out that was never recorded. But there is more where that came from!
These are exciting days. Jazz fans marvel at the artistry of Cartas Ao Vento, and buzz is building for a Latin Grammy nomination. What’s next for you?
I’m thinking about my studio getting operational to produce my next releases, it’s going to be wonderful!
Claudia Villela
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10 Questions with Claudia Villela
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