Samuel Quinto Feitosa, FRSA (born September 5, 1973) is a Brazilian jazz, pop, gospel and classical pianist, as well as music producer, composer, arranger, educator and writer living in Portugal since 2004.
Quinto grew up in Salvador, where he developed his art mainly with the piano. Samuel Quinto was born in Belém, Pará, but grew up in Salvador, Bahia.
Since the age of seven, he developed his musical talent by virtue of the contact with the piano through the gospel, accompanied by the Baptist Church that he studied during his childhood with his family in Salvador.
Then Samuel took the first steps on the piano in the family home, always without accompanying teachers, and developed his piano skills learning also, as self-taught, harmony, reading and writing music and orchestration, musical composition, arrangements for the church choir, which begins to play as a pianist at the age of 12 years. In Europe.
Samuel Quinto released his first CD “Latin Jazz Thrill” in 2007, in Portugal, with trio formation (Bass, Piano and Drums), which formed the core of his repertoire in various festivals and concerts during the years 2007 and 2008 in Portugal.
During his 2008 tour he performed in cities such as Hamburg, Berlin, Cologne, Heilbronn, Liège and Limoges; in addition to a special concert held in Salvador in collaboration with the Catholic University of Salvador in June 2008. His compositions are used at the University of Porto (ESMAE) in the Jazz degree, as study material in the training of Jazz students.
The second CD entitled “Salsa ‘n Jazz”, containing eight original compositions by Samuel Quinto, and the standard Stella by Starlight, is released in June 2009 with a concert in the city of Porto, and the concomitant launch of his new tour.
Even more extensive, which passed through Belgium, Germany, Portugal, Spain, France, Luxembourg, Netherlands and England. In this second work, Samuel was accompanied by another Brazilian, classically trained, Marcos Borges on bass and Manuel Santiesteban, Cuban, graduated in drums in Havana, Cuba.
He founded the first Latin Jazz course at the North Jazz School, Porto – first professional Jazz school accredited in Portugal and one in the Iberian Peninsula to have the Professional Jazz Instrumentalist course until then.
Besides being invited to be the artistic director of one of the most traditional Portuguese jazz clubs, Si bemol.
Samuel has also been invited to conduct workshops in the field of Jazz, Latin Jazz Composition and Arranging both in Brazil and Europe. But his musical talent is not only to jazz, after having been a pianist of the corps de ballet, he began to develop the scholar side of his music.
Inspired by great composers such as Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Tchaikovsky, Brahms and others, he began compositions to accompany ballet in performances, as well as for orchestra and choir. _ (allaboutjazz)
There is something about Brazilian-born pianist Samuel Quinto that strikes a vibrant chord in the inner ear. Perhaps it has to do with his wonderful grasp of the joy that abounds in the Brazilian northeast.
His sense of “joy”. Perhaps it also has to do with his mature approach, his wonderful use of dynamics, his expression and his innate ability to allow the tonal center of his music to shine.
He has an exquisite ear and his hands are independently controlled by his mind, which separates melody and harmony when necessary.
Quinto, as a result, makes his fingers tingle on the keys, rumble and guffaw and cry with chords from which he wrings laughter and sadness and pure joy.
In Salsa’ N Jazz he plays with a primal hypnotic rhythm that calls to the roots of his music, which reach all the way to deepest Africa, through the folk corners of Brazil and Spain, which means the Mediterranean nooks and crannies of the Middle East, India and Europe.
The result is a discotheque where these cultures converge in a point of ignition that warms the blood of the soul. His playing is muscular and intuitive and smacks of an artist who likes to invent on the fly, to constantly evolve.
The starting point of Quinto’s playing is also a deeply symbiotic relationship with forro music in all its vibrant splendor-baiao, xote and arrasta-pe-all elegantly captured and sparkling as his fingers touch ebony and ivory.
The most joyous and memorable display of this is her rendition of Victor Young’s “Stella by Starlight,” which gets a rousing liner treatment and reaches its climax as the song’s choruses unfold.
It is worth mentioning that on this song – as on the others on this album – Brazilian bassist Marcos Borges and Cuban drummer Manuel Santiesteban shine with their wonderful interplay.
Samuel Quinto is also an accomplished composer and demonstrates maturity and a sense of adventure with the rhythmic variety he presents here in a rumba, “Quinto’s Rhumba” which, by the way, is played in a deliciously choppy style reminiscent of Thelonious Monk.
“Jaci” is an exciting, danceable song that crosses Cuban rhythms with a touch of Brazil.
“Bolero To Preta,” an affectionate semblance of the pianist’s mother, suggests that the pianist has a lot of inner clave.
“Ficou No Meio” is simply a marvelous forro that becomes dizzying as Quinto, Borges and Santiesteban gloriously rumba in harmony and rhythm.
Santiesteban gloriously ruminate the harmony and rhythm.
“Voo Da Andorinha” is a chorinho that, quite simply, reveals Quinto’s “Alma de Nordeste”. And “Isabel (Para Voce)” is a beautiful ballad that shimmers and shines as its emotive tonal colors begin to unfold.
“Salsa’ N Jazz” is an emblematic song that captures everything unforgettable about this album: a pianist with the ability to dazzle in silence while the right hand flies exotically and the left constantly invents harmony and rhythm.
Here is a very promising pianist, who brings with him his rich Brazilian tradition and, indeed, all of Latin America, a new and exciting musical landscape. _
Raul D’Gama Rose
Samuel Quinto Trio – Salsa’N Jazz (2009).
Musicians:
Samuel Quinto (Piano)
Marcos Borges (Bass)
Manuel Santiesteban (Drums)
Information provided (September 16, 2023)
Samuel Quinto Feitosa (Neuroscientist and Musician)
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