Benedito Nunes was well connected and released quite a few records in the 1970s. He also appeared on later volumes of the CBS Pau De Sebo compilation series, with original songs that featured almost all of the big forró artists in the 70s, with a few notable exceptions. His earliest records are scarce. Levo Saudades, from 1968, sports a gorgeous cover and the music is beautifully produced. Egal mainly released vinyl in the 1960s and virtually everything on the label is exceedingly rare. Levo Saudades does not even appear in most Nunes discographies. My friends Samuel noted that the same bird cage appears on an Ary Lobo and a Caxanga LP. O Pai Da Gabriela was composed by Elino Julião.
Benedito Nunes - O Pai Da Gabriela Levo Saudades - Egal (year unknown)
Databases and discographies for forró artists are improving, but haven't been as heavily researched as they need to be. My information about the careers of many of these folks is woefully incomplete. Alas, much of the information from this blog will be revised as more complete histories are published.
What is starting to surface is how intertwined the work may have been. While I knew that there was a tight scene around forró, suggested by the cross-collaborative nature of 1970s CBS records, it seems to be traditional for forró musicians to collaborate and cross-pollinate. Many people like Pedro Sertanejo, Abdias and Carlos Diniz may have been producers, engineers, label owners, songwriters, collaborators and session musicians. Forró from at least the 1950s through the 1970s, seemed to be similar to scenes in Nashville or Los Angeles, with lots of the same brilliant session players popping up on multiple records. Forró was more traditional, like the country Nashville scene, and never got quite as weird as the more experimental records coming out of LA in the 1960s.
Carlos Diniz's career as a recording artist spanned from the late 1950s on 78rpm (some reissued on compilation LPs) until the late 1960s with a string of great compactos and a single LP. Forró Do Bom is one of the stronger albums from the period. Diniz also collaborated with and/or wrote songs for a number of important artists from the day, including Luiz Gonzaga, Gordurinha, Zé Gonzaga, Trio Nordestino and Trio Nortista, indicating that he continued working into the early 1970s.
Carlos Diniz - Côco No Rio from Forró Do Bom - Rozenblit (1968)
Carlos Diniz - Pá Pul (baião) from Forró Do Bom - Rozenblit (1968)
Carlos Diniz - O Pinto Piou from Forró Do Bom - Rozenblit (1968)
