Flavia Coelho is a wonderful young Brazilian singer, who draws on the traditions of samba, bossa-nova, and Brazilian melodies – there’s even room in the mix for ragga and hip-hop. Her first album Bossa Muffin has made a huge impact, an uplifting fusion of styles delivered with style and a liberating, effortlessly free-wheeling confidence, and her new album Mundo Meu is released early next year.
‘One of the most joyful, easygoing fusion sets of the year, a rhythmic clash of Brazilian and Caribbean styles… slinky melodies and bursts of rapid-fire hip-hop’ (The Guardian)
Flavia Coelho is a nomad by nature with a thirst for adventure that was inherited from her mother. She experienced all sorts of hell: hanging around some of the most dangerous parts of Rio de Janeiro. Flavia left Brazil in 2006, the very moment she was making a name for herself, to start from scratch in Paris, the city of her dreams. There, the Cameroon guitarist and bass playerPierre Bika Bika taught her African rhythms and with her wrote the first album,Bossa Muffin, which came out in 2011. It is « one of the most joyful, easygoing fusion sets of the year » according to The Guardian while the Financial Timesadds that « the ghost of Manu Chao hangs over its blend of bossa, samba and reggae ».
That same year she obtained the Génération Réservoir Newcomer of the year Award which proved to be a springboard from which she has never looked back; jumping on tours that seemed never-ending, crossing borders and making unforgettable memories like when she opened for Gilberto Gil at Nuits de Fourvière (Lyon) in 2012. The following year, the restless Brazilian brought out the ultra upbeat EP Bossa Muffin – Remixes & Inéditos, contributed to the official theme song for Marseille-Provence European Capital of Culture, received the Golden Women Music Breakthrough prize and got dancing around the happy crowd, the well-known Ultra Bal.
With her new album Mundo Meu, produced by Victor-Attila Vagh and mixed by Tom Fire, Flavia unfolds her inner world like an immense, multicoloured urban map. Her flow resonates to an urban Baile Funk, the Repente of her father becomes Afrobeat, the Forró and Samba find a new life fuelled with Hip-Hop, African roots join Kanak chants, Bolero joins Ragga while East European music becomes tropical via Jamaica. Flavia builds new aural textures on the memory and culture of Brazilian music with the help of German superstarPatrice, cult rapper Speech of Arrested Development, legendary drummerTony Allen and talented accordionist Fixi of Java. Those 13 new and vibrant tracks succeed brilliantly in giving you the urge to join the party with Flavia and your friends!