When I first met Daniela Soledade (Soul-ah-dodgy), she was about to take the stage in a very red dress for one of Nate Najar’s Jazz Holiday shows. She was excited backstage, but it was obvious she was nervous stepping on the Hough Hall stage with a full band that included bassist John Lamb.
But now, six years and a string of sold-out shows later, she’s clearly at home on any stage and she and her partner in music and life, Nate Najar, have built a following both in Tampa Bay and major markets in the U.S. and Europe.
Daniela’s massive mailing list and her social media videos and posts are the envy of most performers I know. Even more impressive is her bossa nova pedigree – she’s from a family of Brazilian musical royalty. And now she’s becoming a star in her own right – last summer’s Pretty World album release show was an artistic and commercial success, with appearances by special guests Roberto Menescal and Antonio Adolfo, and ticket sales of almost 400.
Now, Nate’s Jazz Holiday in December and Daniela’s bossa nova show in the summer are tentpoles of our season. This year’s offering, Deco Tropical, promises to be another must-see evening with special Brazilian guest artists Claudio Infante (drums) and Zé Luis (flute and saxophone) and three backup singers, along with she and Nate’s full band. Daniela and company take the stage with Deco Tropical at 8 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 26 in Hough Hall. For tickets and more information, please follow this link.
For more on the show, read Bill DeYoung’s story from St. Pete Catalyst posted below, or follow this link to read it at the Catalyst site.
This week, Daniela Soledade launches a ‘samba soul journey’
Bill DeYoung/St. Pete Catalyst/8-21-23
Just last month, a large, downtown St. Pete nightclub breathlessly advertised an upcoming concert performance this way: BOSSA NOVA QUEEN DANIELA SOLEDADE.
“That caught me off guard,” laughs the Brazilian-born singer, who doesn’t claim to be any such thing. “I told the band, ‘I didn’t say that, guys.’ It was pretty funny.”
(It was a great show, anyway, and very nearly a sellout.)
Bossa nova combines airy acoustic guitar with intimate vocals – melodic and breezy, words whispered, caressed. It’s tropical, it swings and it sways, and it’s intensely romantic, especially when it’s sung in the original Portuguese.
Soledade, who began performing in the bay area five years ago, may not be actual royalty, but she’s certainly the real deal in bossa nova circles. Her grandfather, Paulo Soledade, co-wrote with musical pioneers Antonio Carlos Jobim, Toquinho, Baden Powell and others. Her father, singer, guitarist and violinist Paulinho Soledade, is also internationally renowned.
Daniela Soledade’s debut album displays her mastery of classic samba and bossa nova … and highlighting the pristine clarity of her vocals.
– Downbeat Magazine, 2019
Soledade’s musical (and otherwise) partner is St. Petersburg guitarist Nate Najar. Together as a duo, in small combos with a full band, Dani and Nate perform bossa nova, samba (a little more rhythmically intense Brazilian music) and jazz. Over the past year, they’ve traveled extensively throughout the South; in June, they performed in Rio de Janeiro (where they were joined by Paulinho) and recently returned from a sold-out run of dates in California.
Saturday (Aug. 26), they’ll be at their second home, the Palladium Theater’s Hough Hall, for a concert Soledade has named Deco Tropical.
“We call it ‘a samba soul journey to paradise,’ because it brings the samba and the bossa nova, but now we’ve also added a soul component to it,” she explains. “So the repertoire is different; it’s a brand new show.”
This concert, she promises, is “full of surprises.” Along with bossa nova and samba, it will explore the two musicians’ earliest rhythm and blues influences. Tasty stuff. “Grown folks’ music,” Najar calls it.
“Because a lot of the same people come to see us at different times, I like to mix things up,” Soledade explains. “I don’t like to play the same show over and over again – I want everybody to continue to be engaged, and I want them to hear something new every time they come out.”
Joining Soledade and Najar will be bassist Joe Porter and pianist Patrick Bettison, members of the couple’s regular bay area band. Brazilian musicians Claudio Infante (drums) and Zé Luis (flute and saxophone) will round out the ranks.
“These two guys used to be in a band with my dad, when they were in their early 20s,” Soledade reports. “This is really cool ‘cause they’re family.” This week’s band also includes backup singers Rebecca Pearl, Samantha Jones and Fernanda Brenneman.
During the week, they’ll all be recording Soledade’s third album (following A Moment of You and Pretty World). Like its predecessors, this new collection is being produced by Najar.
“Nate,” observes Soledade, “is brilliant in everything he does. A musician and a producer. He’s brilliant in every way because he always has the broad view, the big picture of how things work. And how he believes things should be, for us to do certain things.
“And honestly I trust him fully. Nate is probably the single most important component of this operation.”
Soledade says she never takes the support she receives from bay area audiences for granted.
“I come from a very different, very specific set of circumstances, coming from Rio with the family of musicians that I have. It’s a lot of fun to give continuation to this heritage, and to the lineage of my family.
“And to my culture, really. To me it’s just an honor.”
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