Saturday, December 26, 2009

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

BRAZILIAN HEART / DECEMBER 2009




















BRAZILIAN HEART
DECEMBER 2009
SINCE 1998


Just arrived from Guadalajara where I sang with Viver Brasil Dance Co. at Feria del Libro. This year the International Book Fair was honoring the city of Los Angeles. The Fair attracts an incredible
amount of young people who are hungry for Culture. They were amazingly warmth. The organizers offered performances all over town presenting  French, Middle East, African, Indian, Hawaian, Brazilian, and Spanish artists. The Festival of Sacred Music Team treated us beautifully ending our stay with a tour of the city, and a dinner with a margarita included!
If you ever go to Guadalajara, please visit the Palacio del Gubierno to see the Orozco's Murals! It's amazing.
Below, you'll find a list of Brazilian theme gifts I made for you, and a story by Rumi that I want to share. Let me know what you think.
Enjoy. : )




SHOWS:
Sambaguru on December 31st, 2009
@ South Coast Winery (Temecula, CA)
Sambaguru on January 9th, 2010
@ SOB (NY)
http://sobs.com/node/89 

CHRISTMAS GIFT RECOMMENDATIONS:

1.   PAULO COELHO’S Biography by Fernando Morais.
I met Paulo Coelho in Rio when my band played at his wife’s birthday party in Copacabana. One day he visited the apartment I used to live with my partner, and we exchanged books. He got my book about the Middle Ages (he had not written The Alchesmist yet.)  
The Brazilian writer Fernando Morais wrote another book called “Olga,” that I recommend as well.

2.   LULA MARCONDES paintings, drawings, etc.  Lula is from Recife,
Pernambuco, and I met him through Global Crest, a company created by Christi Pemberton and based in North Carolina that did a presentation with Sambaguru’s music. His pieces make me smile.

3.   TRIBO, Sambaguru’s new CD. We are very proud of this new one. Special guests include: Oscar Castro-Neves, Paul Jackson Jr,, Justo Almario, Siedah Garrett (lyricist),The Vine Street Horns,  and more. TRIBO appeared in the preliminary list for the Grammy 2009. Our previous CD, Navegar ao Sol, was also in the preliminary list.) Digstation.com is a great site to purchase from, and treats us with respect. Enjoy the video below!


4.   If you’re crazy about T-SHIRTS and Brasil, try these 2 sites:

5.   BRAZILIAN FILMS


6.   PHOTOGRAPHY BOOK
My friend Jorge Vismara has 2 beautiful books: “The Gift of Water”
with Viver Brasil Dance Co, and “Amazon River.” Check it out!

7.   BRAZILIAN BIKINI
Sometimes girls ask me about the Brazilian “cut.” Ok, here it is.

8.   EYES OF A CHILD – DONATE
Antonio Covarrubia invited me to sing at one of his fundraisings this
year. It was an honor. Please, donate if you can.

9.   YOGA UNVEILED
After watching this movie I realized how much more is to be learned. I’ve been doing Yoga for a long time (Hatha in Brasil, Bikran style here in Los Angeles, and now Kundalini)

10.  SKIN PRODUCTS
I found them at BRAZZIL magazine online.

FOR YOU
JESUS ON THE LEAN DONKEY (By Rumi)

Jesus on the lean donkey,
This is an emblem of how the rational intellect
Should control the animal-soul.
Let your spirit be strong like Jesus.
If that part becomes weak,
Then the worn-out donkey grows to a dragon.

Be grateful when what seems unkind comes from a wise person.
Once, a holy man, riding his donkey, saw a snake crawling into
a sleeping man’s mouth! He hurried, but he couldn’t
Prevent it. He hit the man several blows with his club.

The man woke terrified and ran beneath an apple tree
with many rotten apples on the ground.
“Eat! You miserable wretch! Eat”
“Why are you doing his to me?”
“Eat more you fool.”
“I’ve never seen you before!
Who are you? Do you have some inner quarrel with your soul?”

The wise man kept forcing him to eat, and then he ran him.
For hours he whipped the poor man and made him run.
Finally, at nightfall, full of rotten apples,
Fatigued, bleeding, he fell and vomited everything,
the good and the bad, the apples and the snake.

When he saw that ugly snake come out of himself, he fell on his knees
before his assailant.
“Are you Gabriel? Are you God?
I bless the moment you first noticed me. I was dead
and didn’t know it. You’ve given me a new life.
Everything I’ve said to you was stupid!
I didn’t know.”

“If I had explained what I was doing,
you might have panicked and died of fear.
Muhammad said,
“If I described the enemy that lives inside men, even the most
courageous would be paralyzed. No one would go out, or do any work. No
one would pray or fast, and all power to change would fade from human
beings,’ so I kept quiet while I was beating you, that like David I
might shape iron, so that, impossibly, I might put feathers back into
a bird’s wing.

God’s silence is necessary, because of humankind’s faintheartedness.
If I had told you about the snake, you wouldn’t have been able to eat, and if you hadn’t eaten, you wouldn’t have vomited.

I saw your condition and drove my donkey hard into the middle of it,
saying always under my breath, “Lord, make it easy on him.” I wasn’t
permitted to tell you, and I wasn’t permitted to stop beating you!”

The healed man, still kneeling, “I have no way to thank you for the
quickness of your wisdom and the strength of your guidance.
God will thank you.”

FELIZ NATAL & FELIZ ANO NOVO!
Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Katia : )))