Recorded in NYC and Rio de Janeiro, this is a brilliant reworking of music featured in the 1956 play Orfeu da Conceiç ão and the 1959 film version, Black Orpheus. The former featured music by Antônio Carlos Jobim and lyrics by Vinícius de Moraes, the latter included new songs by Jobim and Luiz Bonfá and helped popularise the bossa nova throughout Brazil and Latin America. Brazilian-born, NYC-based bassist Nilson Matta fell in love with this music as a young child and assembles a fittingly stellar cast that breathes spectacular new life into Jobim’s ‘Overture’, Bonfá’s ‘Samba de Orfeu’, and much more. Key to the enterprise is the outstanding rhythm section of guitarist Guilherme Monteiro plus percussionists Alex Kautz, Fernando Saci, Jorjão Silva, Erivelton Silva and Reinaldo Silva. Matta contributes a brace of fine originals, the powerfully atmospheric ‘Ascend, My Love’, and the coruscating sign-off, ‘Hugs and Kisses’.