LINDA WERTHEIMER, HOST:
Brazilian musician Hamilton de Holanda is taking a tradition born in the 19th century and bringing it into the 21st. It's the musical style known as choro. And for his latest recording, he invited contemporary musicians from around the world to help him interpret the songs of one of choro's pioneers. Betto Arcos brought this story back from Brazil.
BETTO ARCOS, BYLINE: Alfredo Vianna was one of the superstars of choro, better known by his nickname "Pixinguinha."
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ARCOS: The flutist and saxophonist pushed the boundaries of choro by incorporating jazz and ragtime into his compositions.
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ARCOS: Hamilton de Holanda explores that connection on "Mundo de Pixinguinha," "The World of Pixinguinha."
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ARCOS: The Brazilian recorded with Cuban pianist Chucho Valdes, French accordionist Richard Galliano and American trumpeter Wynton Marsalis.
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HAMILTON DE HOLANDA: (Through Translator) As I've traveled around the world in the past 10 years, I became friends with a few musicians and I recorded with a few of them. I thought it would be an opportunity for the music of Pixinguinha to be played by jazz musicians who know about improvisation, and who know how to interpret music that's not theirs.
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ARCOS: De Holanda plays an instrument called bandolim. It evolved from the mandolin, brought to Brazil by Portuguese, and its acknowledged master was a man named Jacob do Bandolim.
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ARCOS: De Holanda says do Bandolim's genius lay in his ability to blend music brought by the Portuguese with that of African slaves to create a perfect balance.
HOLANDA: (Through Translator) He created a Brazilian way with a lot of emotion. You hear in his music little bit of the Fado nostalgia, but also the joy of Brazilian music, and African music, too, and with such care in the refinement of a sound and the arrangements in a most impeccable way.
ARCOS: But de Holanda wanted to take the music further. And he does, says Sergio Mielniczenko. He's producer and host of "The Brazilian Hour," a radio program distributed across the U.S. and around the world.
SERGIO MIELNICZENKO: He's a musician with an incredible technique and a deep interpretation to the soul of Brazilian music. If you look at his repertoire, he plays everything from Jacob do Bandolim to Egberto Gismonti to Hermeto Pascoal. And more recently he has been pairing with very outstanding musicians as well. That's what is interesting about Hamilton. You cannot see him as a choro composer, only. Obviously, he plays choro but he's beyond. Hamilton de Holanda is music.
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ARCOS: De Holanda plays a special kind of bandolim. Normally, the instrument has eight strings, just like the mandolin. De Holanda had one built with ten strings.
HOLANDA: (Through translator) I wanted to create a polyphony in my instrument, and be able to play the melody, the accompaniment and the rhythm, all at the same time. Just as you see in a piano soloist, or a guitar soloist, I wanted to express some polyphonic ideas in the bandolim, the same way a piano works in a jazz trio.
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ARCOS: De Holanda's ideas about what the bandolim can do led him to collaborate with a pianist - Italian Stefano Bollani - for another recently-released recording.
HOLANDA: (Through Translator) The bandolim has certain musical off-keys. The piano is always perfectly in tune. Perhaps the defect of the bandolim, which is a difficult instrument to tune, is that when it's paired with a piano, magic is born, which is something I cannot explain.
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ARCOS: De Holanda says though he started playing choro, he's emphatic about where he's taking the music.
HOLANDA: (Through Translator) What I'm doing today is not exactly choro, it's not only samba, and it's not just jazz. It's all of the above, the confluence of all of it. Out of all that is the music of Hamilton de Holanda.
ARCOS: It's safe to say Pixinguinha would approve. For NPR News, I'm Betto Arcos.
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WERTHEIMER: This is WEEKEND EDITION from NPR News. BJ Leiderman wrote our theme music. I'm Linda Wertheimer.