Artist Bio:
Cabruêra is a typical expression from the northeast of Brazil that comes from the word cabras, which can mean goats or a bunch of people. In this case, it means the gathering of the most amazing musical group formed in Brazil in recent years. The blending of contemporary sounds with some of the most typical musical forms from the northeast, like the Martelos, the Galopes and the Cirandas, is quite unique and part of their program. Playing with their Brazilian roots, Cabruêra create rich harmonic and melodic lines through electrifying cocos, invading cirandas or sampling repentes.
The band Cabruêra was founded in Campina Grande, Paraíba (Brazil), in 1998. Vivid members of the musical movement of the northeast of Brazil from the start, they performed in events like the Saint John's celebration in Campina Grande, the largest popular celebration of the region, and in the Abril Pro Rock in Recife, Pernambuco. They all come from a rock background and the regional styles were not their first musical options. But in their musical encounter the current and the primitive now come together forming a real new sound alchemy: a mix of forró with Pink Floyd, coco with Hermeto Paschoal, ciranda with Funk, maracatú with Frank Zappa, embolada with Rock, a cocktail of rhythms and musical traditions without losing the roots. And they rock it with a ballpoint guitar, the amazing invention of Cabruêra's founder Arthur Pessoa. The man picked up a cheap ballpoint pen and began to rub the strings of his acoustic guitar with it, creating a sound that is a mix of a cello and a berimbau, a typical percussion instrument from the state of Bahia.
All the musicians are multi-talented and play several different instruments, shifting from an acoustic guitar to a bass drum, from a lead vocal to a zabumba, the typical drum from the pulsating northeastern rhythms. And Arthur Pessoa, who decided to switch his Cultural Anthropologies studies to adventure into modern music with Cabruêra, is not the only inventive and creative one. Fredi Guimarães plays a beautiful acoustic guitar, but also is seen in the percussion front and in the drum kit playing all kinds of things. He's a studied guitar player and takes part in folk and chorinho groups.
Zé Guilherme is the lead vocalist on some songs, and on others he is pumping the zabumba like nobody else. Buddhist, art lecturer and street children worker, he's also been a percussionist in the Orquestra Sinfônica da Paraíba for 14 years. Fabiano Soares keeps the pulse of the band in his five string bass guitar and sometimes as leading a vocal or playing the agogo in the rhythm section. A music professional since 1991, he has played with Orquestra Casa Blanca in Rio de Janeiro, the Cowboys, Banda do Zé Godá, Meio da Mata, Geridum and many others.
Last but not least, Tom Rocha, drummer of the band, can also be heard singing on several tunes. He was percussionist in the band Maracatu Nação Pernambuco, presented at the New Orleans Jazz Fest 2000, and played in the Banda Cidade Central in Recife. —Courtesy Calabash Music
