Pascoal Saints Day

Hermeto Pascoal Grupo + Sadao Watanabe - Jegue

I'm sick af with food poisoning from supermarket sushi, but between trips to the porcelain throne I have come to place a true visionary upon his.

His isn't porcelain, though. Pure Platinum.

Most music aficionados know him from a lone cameo he did on a Miles Davis -- it should say all you need to know that MDIII positively worshiped this cat -- record. Although we know that's just the tip of the trip.

When you get into iconic figures like this -- this person is easily one of the most revered musicians ever to come from Brazil, a country that has produced a whole lotta top-ranking players and composers -- it's almost impossible to find adequate or even half-assed words to do them any kind of reasonable justice.

I will say this, however: When I think of music today, and I think of what it's so manifestly lacking, I think of the word organic.

And there's never, ever been, and likely won't ever be, a music person whose output and approach embodied that organic quality more than Hermeto Pascoal, who died at 89 about six weeks ago after an extensive career putting the organic, natural Muse into every iota of sound he made.

An albino from birth and thusly socially challenged by the taunts of other kids, his dad gave him an accordion at age 4 and, well, I'm pretty sure he was glad he did.

PSA: Seriously, if you're a parent reading this, please run out immediately and get your child their musical instrument of choice ASAP, I am just saying.

By seven, he was onto the million flute varieties that would become a main axe for him as his art arc trajectoried through the decades.

From there it was (here comes that word again) an organic progression to the various wind and reed instruments he'd add to his formidable arsenal.

During his come-up he also learned piano, as if he needed to be a virtuoso on yet another thing.

PSA II: Listening parents? This phony AI Autotune assholery may go outta style soon, and you don't want little Johnny and poor l'il Janey to be left out in the cold cutout bin, do you? Hie thee! To thy nearest Music Instrument Emporium forthwith!

Because if you look around you, what you're seeing is what happens when Music is taken out of schools.

Anyway Hermeto Pascoal is a whole lot more than just a nice tune on a wild Miles Electric platter, and I'm bringing you some proof from under a Tokyo sky at the close of the Sizzlin' Seventies.

Hermeto Pascoal Grupo + Sadao Wantanabe

Live Under the Sky '79 

"Brazilian Night"

Denen Coliseum

Tokyo, Japan

7.29.1979

01 introductions

02 Birds

03 Just Cruisin'

04 Manha de Carnaval

05 Samba Em Praia

06 Samba Do Marcos

07 Serenade

08 Jegue

09 California Shower

10 Instant Tokyo

11 Suite Paulistana

12 Montreux

13 Susto

14 Lagoa da Canoa

Total time: 1:55:53

disc break goes after Track 06

Tracks 11-14 are bonus tracks from the Montreux Jazz Festival, Montreux CH 7.20.1979

these are unissued outtakes from the classic 1979 "Ao Vivo Montreux" album on the Atlantic label

Hermeto Pascoal - keyboards, flutes, reeds, pianica, vocals & percussion 

Claudio Araújo Chamie de Queiroz - reeds & flutes 

Antonio Luiz de Santana (Pernambuco) - percussion 

Jovino Jose Dos Santos-Neto - keyboards 

Realcino Lima Filho (Nenê) - drums & percussion 

Rosemarie Pidner (Zabelê) - percussion 

Itiberê Luiz Zwarg - bass 

Nivaldo Ornelas - reeds & flute

Sadao Watanabe - alto & soprano saxophones (Tracks 01-10 only)

the Tokyo portion is sourced from a (likely 1st or 2nd gen) off-air FM cassette capture of the original NHK-FM broadcast

the Montreux portion is sourced from a master off-air FM cassette capture of a broadcast from WBUR-FM in Boston, MA

edited, repaired, slightly remuxed, assembled and remastered for unity by EN, October 2025
725 MB FLAC/direct link

This one has circulated forever, but it's not hard to understand why when you hear this mega-band Hermeto Pascoal is leading, as the audience goes justifiably buck wild.

I will try to sneak in the other death post I have ready after Daylight Savings time hits here in a few hours, but I was compelled to memorialize HP and worked on this show for a bit -- which also features Japanese reed god Sadao Watanabe blowing his mind throughout its two hours of Samba Fusion mayhem, as well as all the Montreux Jazz Festival takes that didn't make HP's 1979 burning live album Ao Vivo -- so it might be in a state worthy of such a galaxy-class Maestro!--J.

6.22.1936 - 9.13.2025