BRATTLEBORO — Who knew that the Girl from Ipanema moved to Vermont?
Well, not exactly. But bossa nova is getting a new lease on life thanks to a local musician and Brattleboro Retreat instructor who composes and plays in that warm style, first popularized in America by that iconic song.
Singer-songwriter Jesse Lepkoff and his four-piece band, Serenata Bossa Nova, will host an afternoon of Lepkoff's own Brazilian bossa nova-influenced compositions to celebrate the release of his newest CD, “I'll Call it Ecstasy” at the Mahalo Performing Arts Center, 972 Western Ave., West Brattleboro, on Sunday, Feb. 17, from 4 to 6 pm.
The concert will be a mix of Lepkoff's solo performances and group songs performed by his quartet: Lepkoff on vocals and guitar, Alison Hale on flute, Gary Henry on drums, and Daniel Kasnitz on bass.
Tickets can be purchased just for the concert, though packages are also being offered that include signed copies of “I'll Call it Ecstasy” and Lepkoff's “View of the Past” (2010).
Lepkoff (www.jesselepkoff.com) said he first came to bossa nova through American jazz saxophonist Stan Getz's version of Girl From Ipanema on his father's copy of “Getz/Gilberto” (1964) that Jesse stumbled across as a child.
“Getz/Gilberto,” by Getz and Brazilian guitarist João Gilberto, features composer and pianist Antonio Carlos Jobim, and became one of the best selling jazz albums of all time.
“I loved that record,” he says, “and I played it over and over again. I really admired Getz, but I was most drawn to the guitar playing and style of singing of boss nova.”
As Lepkoff writes in the liner notes for “Ecstacy,” “My first inspiration for songwriting came from the songs of Antonio Carlos Jobin. Since my teens, I have had a passion for Brazilian bossa nova, most as performed by the great guitarist and singer João Gilberto.”
“Bossa nova is the pop music of Brazil,” says Lepkoff.
Originating in the music clubs lining the avenues of Rio de Janeiro in the 1950s, bossa nova is a lyrical music with sophisticated chords, harmonies, and syncopation that itself flowered from an American jazz-influenced samba, long recognized as a symbol of Brazil and the Brazilian Carnival.
But Lepkoff said he feels American jazz artists often distort the subtly of the music with their own pyrotechnic improvisations.
“Jazz becomes a vehicle to throw a lot of mud at this kind of music,” he says.
He believes his performances are closer to the music's purer origins.
“Bossa nova has a subtler, more sensitive side that I try to respect,” he says. “I strive for a softer, cleaner sound.”
Vermont summers stirred the pot
Although Lepkoff says he is greatly influenced by the distinctive Brazilian popular music, his songs are not orthodox bossa nova. He claims that he often writes hybrid “art songs” combining “the essence of tropical Brazil with the woodiness of Vermont.”
Lepkoff grew up in New York City, but as his family owned a house near Pikes Falls, he spent early summers vacationing in Vermont.
“Coming from New York City's Lower East Side with all its noise and bustle, Vermont seemed almost miraculous. It was a special childhood place, with its waist-tall grass and the woodland thrush. The landscape became a big musical influence on my life,” he says.
He said he always knew he wanted to be a musician and the guitar was the first instrument he learned to play. He became a flautist, studying classical and baroque early music styles for many years, He became a member of the celebrated Boston Camerata (www.bostoncamerata.com), an early music ensemble to which he still belongs.
Lepkoff traveled the world for 20 years, playing medieval-style flutes and recorders in concerts in opulent cathedrals and chambers where the music would have originally been heard.
Ten years ago, he picked up guitar again and, upon strumming some chords from a classic bossa nova song, he rediscovering an old love.
Lepkoff turned to bossa nova as a way to process a difficult break up of a long relationship.
“In 2002, I started to learn the bossa nova repertoire with this vocabulary of rich harmonies and syncopated rhythms,” he says. “I began writing songs and discovered a vibrant new avenue of personal expression and creative satisfaction. I was hooked. I found it highly therapeutic, to put words and music to my sadness and angst. Fooling around with chords and melody, my first song came out. It was the most creative thing I had ever done, and I was sort of overwhelmed by my accomplishment. So I kept on doing it.”
In deeply personal songs which explore themes of discovery, loss and wonderment, he mixed his memories of times past with his love of the natural beauty of Vermont.
“Many of my songs have a nostalgic feeling to them which aligns with what Brazilians call saudade, a kind of yearning or longing,” he says.
Home at the Retreat
After hearing the Brattleboro Retreat needed someone for a summer teaching job, Lepkoff applied.
“When the director saw my portfolio, which includes pictures of my musical performances as well as photos of some of my other interests, [such as] cake-making and woodworking, he became impressed with all my diverse abilities and decided to design a job around those skills,” Lepkoff says.
“At my other interviews all they cared about was that I didn't have teaching experience.”
Now Lepkoff teaches classes in music, cooking and woodworking.
“It has been a really great experience,” he says. “In my music classes, I have worked with middle and high school kids on writing songs. In cooking, I've had the kids at the Retreat make fancy lunches, with table clothes and planned menus. It is great occupational therapy. We've created a coffee cart that goes through the Retreat selling the pastries we make in our classes. We've raised a lot of money with it for our program.”
Lepkoff's Mahalo concert will be the public debut of his two CDs.
“I'm encouraged that I'm finding more of my own style of songwriting,” he says. “The lyrics are vivid, visual, honest and intimate, and are about my personal journeys and beliefs. Common threads run through many songs: dreams and fantasies, birds, love, loss, water, the heavens and memory.”