Milton Nascimento, a musical deity in Brazil, collaborates with the bassist, vocalist and producer Esperanza Spalding on an album that contemplates age’s effect on art.
In 1955, Milton Nascimento was 13, learning to sing and, devastatingly to him, hitting puberty.
“When I began to see my voice deepening, I said, ‘I don’t want to sing anymore,’” Nascimento, one of Brazil’s most important musical figures, recalled last week in an interview. “Because men don’t have heart.”
He was crying, he said, when a smooth, soulful croon came from the radio. It was Ray Charles singing “Stella by Starlight.” “After I heard that, I said, ‘Now I can sing.’”
Over the next six decades blossomed one of music’s great voices, an ethereal force that spanned octaves with emotion and verve, gliding seamlessly between a velvety baritone and a celestial falsetto.
Nascimento’s unique sound and ascent to the highest notes helped influence a generation of artists. In an interview, Paul Simon called his voice “silky magic.” Philip Bailey, a singer in Earth, Wind & Fire, compared it to “a beautiful Brazilian beach.” Sting described it as “truth in beauty.”
In Brazil, where Nascimento’s voice led singalong anthems and emotional ballads, the nation settled upon an even grander metaphor: “the voice of God.”
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Source: Music - nytimes.com
