My Heart Speaks

Albumbeschreibung

Iconic Brazilian singer/composer Ivan Lins has written many MPB standards revered at home and abroad. American singers including Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Barbra Streisand, Shirley Horn, and Blossom Dearie have recorded his songs. In 1980, Quincy Jones produced George Benson's reading of "Love Dance," and he cut "Velas" for The Dude in 1981. Vocalist Mark Murphy and Brazilian fusion trio Azymuth released Night Mood, a collection of Lins' songs, in 1986. Composer/trumpeter Terence Blanchard collaborated with Lins on The Heart Speaks in 1995. In 2000, the tribute album A Love Affair included contributions from Sting and Chaka Khan. Resonance Records, whose founder George Klabin is a longtime fan, released Eddie Daniels' star-studded Night Kisses: A Tribute to Ivan Lins in 2020. Klabin also commissioned My Heart Speaks. Lins chose this career-spanning program of well-known and obscure songs. He's supported by the 91-member Tbilisi Symphony Orchestra and a jazz quartet (Josh Nelson, piano; Mauricio Zottarelli, drums and percussion; Carlitos Del Puerto, bass; Leo Amuedo, guitar). German composer/arranger Kuno Schmid wrote charts. Lins sings and gets alternating guest support from trumpeter Randy Brecker and vocalists Dianne Reeves, Tawanda, and Jane Monheit. The latter, an expert interpreter of Lins' music, also contributes English lyrics to two songs. Set opener "Renata Maria" is a lush samba buoyed by fretless jazz bass, strings, winds, lithe piano, and organic percussion. Lins, though 78, retains elasticity and suppleness in his reedy, smooth tenor in relating the story of a siren-like goddess who drives a man mad. He also offers its mirror image in "E Isso Acontece" (a rare tune with self-penned lyrics), as love is lost and the protagonist moves on, grateful for the experience. The title track, sung by Reeves (with words by Monheit) contains an elegant intro by string and jazz quartets worthy of George Gershwin. Monheit's reading of "Rio" near the album's end bears her lyrics and indelible vocal signature in a gauzy reverie of the composer's birthplace. Lins' "I'm Not Alone" is sung by Tawanda with English lyrics by Will Jennings. Lins' interpretations can be edifying. His "Congada Blues" finds him and Kana Shimanuki dueting in chants above a funky samba. "Corpos," co-composed with longtime collaborator Vitor Martins, is a jazz waltz layered with syncopated percussion, slippery guitar, brass, reeds, and strings; Lins' expansive, emotionally raw vocal poignantly addresses the plight of the "disappeared" during Brazil's two-decade military rule. He has recorded the romantically desperate closer "Nada Sem Você" several times before, but never like this. Framed by delicate piano, strings, guitar, and brushed snare, the singer pleads for his beloved to remain, but she is already gone. My Heart Speaks also includes liner notes by James Gavin with extensive commentary by Lins. This late-career release is revelatory, as Lins gets inside his songs to impart emotional nuances hidden in both lyrics and music. The program is elegant and potent throughout, presenting Lins in a musical setting befitting his artistry.
© Thom Jurek /TiVo