Badi Assad
With the worldwide PolyGram release of Chameleon, Badi Assad (Pronounced Bah-Jee Ah-Sahje) emerged as an important new voice. Badi transcends traditional styles of her native Brasilian music with an exotic mixture of ethnic sounds from around the world. As a result, the extraordinary singer, guitarist, and percussionist is successfully forging an exhilarating genre of music that quite literally defies categorization.
As a singer, Badi is vibrant and electric, responding to her inner passion with deft creativity. As a guitarist, she has inspired audiences and critics worldwide with a unique combination of technical mastery and innovation that has caused many to reexamine their notions about the instrument. Through it all, Badi’s adventurous spirit and buoyant personality have become an integral part of her music.
Badi Assad was born in the small city of Sao Joao da Boa Vista, Sao Paulo. Her early years were spent in Rio de Janeiro, where the family moved to support and develop the budding talent of her brothers, Sergio and Odair, the famous classical guitarists ‘Duo Assad’. She attributes the success of her brothers’ music career to the strength of her family and the determination of her parents, Jorge and Angelina. “My father put his whole life aside to give my brothers a chance, and everybody in the little town where we lived said ‘Are you crazy to give your life away for two little kids just to play guitar?’”
Watching her brothers’ musical development surely must have had its effect, and her introduction to music came at her mother’s urging. “I began to learn piano when I was eight, but all we could afford was a little electronic Yamaha which was made for kids, and I practiced on it until my hands outgrew the keyboards.” Her guitar studies began in earnest at age fourteen. When her older brothers left home to begin their international careers, Badi became the designated heir apparent as a foil for her father’s own mandolin playing. She picked up on the guitar quickly and her father, who had seen this talent before, soon had her studying music at the University of Rio de Janeiro. In 1984 she won the Concurso Jovens Instrumentistas for Young Musicians and was well on her way to developing her own creative direction.
In 1987, she was named “Best Brazilian Guitarist of the International Villa Lobos Festival.” A year later, Assad recorded her first solo album, entitled Danca dos Tons which was only released in Brazil. The following year she composed Antagonismus, a solo work that incorporated her talent as a singer, guitarist, and dancer. Badi was given the chance to focus on her blossoming vocal talent when she was selected out of two hun dred women to perform as one of two vocalists in the play Mulheres de Hollanda. The theatrical collage of songs by Brazilian composer Chico Buarque ran five days a week for over a year garnering rave reviews for Badi’s looming star potential in the process.
With a new found confidence, Badi began to experiment even further with her voice. Mouth percussion and rhythmic body percussion became part of this exploration. These elements were intuitively combined with her already impressive guitar approach thus creating excitingly fresh sounds that complemented her vision as musician and performer. Just as Badi’s innovative new direction began to emerge, opportunities began to present themselves ; with 1994 came her association with the independent Chesky records. Her first album, entitled “Solo”, introduced Badi as a potent force in the guitar world. Her international stature grew with the release of her second album “Rhythms” in 1995. In fact, “Rhythms” was lauded as one of the most important guitar recording of that year. The album won Guitar Player magazine’s Readers’ Poll for “Best Classical album of the Year” (The Guitar Player editors jokingly commented: “not a classical album but played on classical guitar…close enough!”). In addition, she was voted “Best Acoustic Fingerstyle Player” by Guitar Player magazine’s editors.
Assad fulfilled her Chesky contract with 1996’s beautiful anthology of Brazilian guitar composers appropriately entitled Echoes of Brazil. Then in 1997, Badi was quickly signed to her first major label contract with the brand new PolyGram subsidiary i.e Music. The result is the ambitious and critically acclaimed ehno-pop soundscapes of Chameleon.
The energetic intent of Chameleon is connecting with a multitude of cultures without the benefit of major marketing dollars or mass airplay. Her breathtaking appearance on the French night-time talk show Canal+ was seen by over two million viewers leaving the hosts speechless and the studio audience on their feet!. In July of 1998, Badi played Europe’s most renowned summer festivals sharing the stage with such artists as Cassandra Wilson, Joe Cocker, Maria Joao and fellow Brazilians Chico Cesar, Marisa Monte, and Gilberto Gil.
Each review for her concerts and albums holds the air of discovery, of a new voice for the guitar, of admiration for Assad’s innovation and unusual application. According to the Los Angeles Times, “Badi Assad redefines solo (guitar) performance! Revelatory, a brilliant display of innovation, imagination, and skill…almost hypnotically compelling!”
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