A Vida Me Fez Assim

In the mid '00s The Word was my favourite music magazine and I would buy it most months, provided issues made their way to the corner of Sweden where I then lived. They had an unoriginal recurring feature where a music-related personality would be invited to recommend some of their favourite media of the moment. In one of those the subject in question (I forget who it was) enthused about Teresa Cristina and about this album specifically. I don't know if I'd have had any way then of trying it before buying, so my order may have been a blindly speculative one.

It worked out well: I like it very much. These are old-fashioned, acoustic samba singalongs in which Teresa Cristina is the lead vocalist and the obvious star of the show. My copy seems to be a Spanish issue on a Brazilian label. The songs are all in Portuguese (as are the booklet and cover text). While I understand very few of the words, it's clear that TC has a beautifully expressive & soulful voice, one that sounds like it belongs to someone who has done some hard living. Her backing band, Grupo Semente, appear to be a trio, but on most tracks they're augmented by three, four or more additional musicians.

If Google Translate is to be believed, the CD's title translates as "Life Made Me This Way", which, if true, puts Teresa Cristina on the opposite side of the Nature vs. Nurture debate to Lady Gaga and her 'Born This Way'. My favourite track is the glorious 'Quantas Lágrimas', and I also very much enjoy the rousing closer 'Portela', featuring guest vocalist Cristina Buarque along with a veritable orchestra & chorus of other guests. The CD is enhanced with some additional content: specifically PDFs of the song lyrics annotated with chord charts. It also includes an installer for Adobe Acrobat version 5, should one not have the means of opening them!

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This is a Recording

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