At a choro concert I attended on New York's Lower East Side, I was clued in to an upcoming show with guitarist Douglas Lora backing up singer Verônica Ferriani. Lora gave me glowing reports about this young woman who is part of a new generation of great singers in the tradition of Música Popular Brasileira, or MPB. Based on the quality of Mr. Lora's last choro performance, I went to check it out.Ms. Ferriani is a petite woman, but listening to her sing is a very large experience. Her voice is warm, precise and powerful, and she has an impeccable interpretive style. She is on the rise in Brazil -- so remember, you saw her here first!

The evening's repertoire drew from mostly well known sources, Gilberto Gil, Chico Buarque, Luis Gonzaga, Tom Jobim, and Milton Nascimento, to name a few. And Ms. Ferriani even ventured into American jazz standard territory. But sticking to the Brazilian side of the program, I've chosen two songs: "Canção do Sal," a soulful work song by Milton Nascimento that I was not familiar with, and the grand chestnut "Manha de Carnaval" also known as the Theme from Black Orpheus. Ms. Ferriani takes on this song that has been sung by just about everyone (No less an icon than Dinah Shore evidently did a cover in Portuguese!) and gives it an authentic and personal reading.

I was also fortunate to get an audio track off the board from the Living Room, as they were taping the show for "The Loft" series on Sirius Satellite radio, so the sound is nice and clean. And if you want to hear the whole show, mark your calendars, 'cause it's airing Sunday June 5th at 7pm EST, on Sirius XM channel 30, "From the Living Room to the Loft" with encore presentations on following Tuesdays at 12noon, for two weeks.

Contact for Verônica Ferriani: eric@mtalifetime.com
To see an exclusive performance by Doug and Veronica, go to: goo.gl/​xN6id

Keeping a band together in NYC is TOUGH.  I know because I've done it -- or tried to do it -- myself. So I have to hand it to Scott Kettner for sheer tenacity, regarding his pet project "Nation Beat." You may remember Scott as one of my very first interviews for this blog, about his Forro Brass Band. He made me promise back then to blog something about Nation Beat, so I started collecting and shooting footage, and letting the story develop.

Scott does raise an interesting issue, regarding "world music." In the fledgling days of the term, it was assumed that Cajun, Zydeco, Tex-Mex, Bluegrass, etc. were all part of world music. (Just check out the landmark "Rough Guide to World Music" published in 1994.) Since then, the term has expanded to include all kinds of hybrids. So in my opinion it's a kind of daft political correctness to exclude the Country Music influences in the Nation Beat repertoire...after all they aren't getting up there and doing an all-Country set; it's American Country filtered through Brazilian Country.  And anyway, our Country Music derives from our Scots-Irish heritage, does it not?  Or does that not qualify as world music to some folks any more?