BRAZILIAN SENSATION AND LATIN GRAMMY WINNER CARLINHOS BROWN JOINS CREATIVE TEAM OF “BLACK ORPHEUS”
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, PLEASE
BRAZILIAN SENSATION
AND
LATIN GRAMMY WINNER
CARLINHOS BROWN
JOINS THE ALL-STAR CREATIVE TEAM OF
NEW MUSICAL STAGE ADAPTATION OF
“BLACK ORPHEUS”
GRAMMY AWARD WINNER SIEDAH GARRETT
ALSO JOINS THE PRODUCTION AS LYRICIST
HEADSHOTS FOR CARLINHOS AND SIEDAH CAN BE FOUND HERE
New York, NY (April 19, 2022) – Producers Stephen Byrd and Alia Jones-Harvey announced that Academy Award Nominated and Latin Grammy Winner Carlinhos Brown and Academy Award Nominated and Grammy Award Winner Siedah Garrett have joined the all-star creative team of the new musical stage adaptation of Black Orpheus as composer and lyricist, respectively. This announcement comes on the eve of the long-awaited return of Brazil’s Carnival – the biggest celebration on earth, which has been cancelled for the past two years due to COVID-19.
Mr. Byrd and Ms. Jones-Harvey said, “There is nothing more thrilling to us than the opportunity to introduce American audiences to towering international talents — and talents simply don’t get more towering than Carlinhos and Siedah. It has been our top priority to craft a show and a sound that is Brazilian to its core, and their contributions will go a huge way in helping us meet that mission.”
As previously announced, the new musical features a book by Pulitzer Prize winner Nilo Cruz and direction and choreography by Tony Award winner Sergio Trujillo.
The show is currently being readied for its world premiere on Broadway during the 2023-2024 season, which would make it the first Brazilian musical in the history of Broadway. A developmental workshop and an out-of-town regional theatre run are being planned for Fall 2022 and early 2023, respectively, before heading to Broadway in the 2023-2024 season. In addition to the original new music, the score will include many of the legendary Antonio Carlos Jobim, Luiz Bonfa, and Vinicius de Moraes themes from the motion picture.
Originally based on the play Orfeu de Conceição by the great Moraes, Black Orpheus resets the classic Greek love story of Eurydice and Orfeu against the backdrop of a Rio de Janeiro favela during Carnival. Equal parts celebratory, erotic, haunting and tragic, Black Orpheus became an instant classic of popular culture, winning the Cannes Palme d’Or and the 1959 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and introduced the world to Bossa Nova.
Additional details and announcements about Black Orpheus on Broadway are forthcoming.
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BIOGRAPHIES
CARLINHOS BROWN (Music). Responsible for repositioning the percussive music on the national Brazilian scene, renowned for his rhythmic revitalizations, his role as an art educator, and for the exuberance of his performances, Carlinhos Brown is a fundamental name for Brazilian and world music and culture. First Brazilian musician to be part of The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, and to receive the titles of Ibero-American Ambassador for Culture and Ambassador of Restorative Justice of Bahia, he is a composer, singer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist, technician of the three Brazilian versions of “The Voice”, and visual artist.
Throughout a powerful artistic trajectory, master Carlinhos Brown has trained more than 15,000 musicians around the world, always developing rich and significant connections with his ancestral roots. Among the various awards received throughout his career, a Goya Award, 2 Latin Grammys and 8 nominations stand out, in addition to the trophy given in recognition of his work as an art educator by ISME -International Society of Music Education.
Carlinhos Brown is among the early pioneers of the Axé Music movement, he created the group Timbalada, Os Zárabes, Bolacha Maria, Vai Quem Vem, Pracatum, Guetho Square, the historic and legendary studio Ilha dos Sapos, the Museu du Ritmo, the Candyall Music Seal, among thousands of other projects, in addition to accounting for more than 800 registered songs and more than a thousand recordings registered in the Ecad database – Central Office for Collection and Distribution.
In February 2022, he released a new album with unpublished reinterpretations of great carnival classics, bringing new arrangements, called “SIM.ZÁS”. Between 2020 and 2021, the musician released four other albums: “Axé Inventions – Àjààlà”; “Umbalista” and “Umbalista Verão”, albums that bring together great hits and unpublished versions in his own voice of authorial compositions consolidated in the voice of other artists; and the children’s album “Paxuá e Paramim em: A Floresta dos rios voadores”, bringing together 10 songs with messages of environmental preservation, which are also part of the Environmental Belonging Program, which presents children’s educational booklets with the Paxuá and Paramim team.
SIEDAH GARRETT (Lyrics) is a Grammy Award-winning and two-time Academy Award-nominated songwriter, best known for co-writing the iconic hit song “Man In The Mirror” for Michael Jackson. Other popular artists to have recorded on Siedah’s original songs include Diana Ross, Quincy Jones, Earth Wind & Fire, Aretha Franklin and countless others. Her extensive songwriting credits for film and television include the song “Love You I Do” with Grammy Award-winner composer Henry Krieger, recorded by Jennifer Hudson for the film adaptation of “Dreamgirls”, which garnered Garrett a Grammy Award and Oscar nomination; also the song “Real In Rio” featuring Anne Hathaway and Jamie Foxx, co-written with Grammy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated songwriters Sergio Mendes and Carlinhos Brown with Academy Award-nominated composer John Powell, for the animated film RIO, for which she received her second Oscar nomination.
Siedah recently made the transition to lyric-writing for musical theatre. In 2018, she collaborated with Emmy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated composer John Debney, and the songwriting team of Alan Zachary & Michael Weiner, to create the holiday musical My Silent Night, produced by Richard Kraft, which was commissioned by and premiered in Salzburg, Austria. The musical has now been adapted into a made-for-TV Christmas musical film proposal. Currently, Siedah has been commissioned as principal lyricist for the stage musical production of Will Smith’s hit film, “The Pursuit of Happyness”, with composers Grammy-nominated Harvey Mason, Jr., and Drama Desk Award-winner Justin Ellington. In addition, she signed on to the Broadway-bound musical adaptation of the 1959 film Black Orpheus with composer Carlinhos Brown, being produced by Tony Award nominated Front Row Productions, and directed by Tony Award-winner Sergio Trujillo. Also, two of her songs, “Man In The Mirror” and “Keep The Faith”, her collaboration with Michael Jackson and Grammy Award-winner Glen Ballard, are featured in the new Broadway show MJ the Musical, also produced by Front Row Productions, which opened in February at the Neil Simon Theatre.
Most recently, Siedah has been selected by the songwriting team of Grammy Award-winning and Tony Award-nominated composers Stephen Bray and Brenda Russell to replace their deceased partner, the legendary Allee Willis, for the forthcoming “The Color Purple” musical film, being produced by Stephen Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey, Quincy Jones and Scott Sanders. Siedah’s song “Together All The Way”, cowritten with Daytime Emmy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated composer Kris Bowers for the Netflix hit series “Dear White People”, was recently nominated for a songwriting award by her peers in the Society of Composers & Lyricists (SCL), and, her commissioned work with Drama Desk Award-winning composer Andrew Lippa for the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus premiered in April of this year.
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