CARLOS LYRA
50 YEARS OF BOSSA NOVA

How do you determine the most significant year in the career of an artist? The year of the first recording, the first record, the first public presentation? For a composer, nothing is more important than his first composition, especially when it is interpreted by artists like Caetano Veloso and Danilo Caymmi, to mention only some of the most recent recordings. "Quando Chegares" is one of those cases. The first song (music and lyric) by Carlos Lyra, composed in 1954 when he was still an adolescent. Others would follow that same year: "Menina", "Barquinho de Papel", "Só Mesmo Por Amor", "Aonde Andou Você" and "Ciúme". The first steps in a career that added brilliance to Brazilian music and, together with Bossa Nova, raised it to a worldwide category of music.

In these 50 years, he released 29 recordings, including CDs and LPs, not counting the compilations, represented Brazil in various international events, wrote 3 books, taught guitar at his academy, appeared in innumerable shows, wrote, directed, staged and won awards for his plays (adult and children), in Brazil and abroad, wrote music for plays by Millôr Fernandes, Dias Gomes and Nikolai Gogol, to cite only a few, founded the CPC of UNE, was music director of the National Radio, lived in self-exile for more than eight years, wrote scores for cinema, acted in various films and was recorded by hundreds of musicians, composers and interpreters all around the world.

Without mentioning the pleasure of having as music partners: Ronaldo Bôscoli, Geraldo Vandré, Chico de Assis, Oduvaldo Viana Filho, Daniel Caetano, Maria Clara Machado, Gianfrancesco Guarnieri, Nelson Lins e Barros, Francisco Cervantes, Kate Lyra, Marino Pinto, Vinícius de Moraes, Jésus Rocha, Norman Gimble, Ruy Guerra, Heitor Valente, Chico Buarque, Paulo César Pinheiro, Zé Kéti, Millôr Fernandes, Daltony Nóbrega, Dolores Duran, Castro Alves, Machado de Assis, John Court, Paulinho Tapajós, Roberto Menescal and Joyce.

50 years of music. 50 years that deserve to be celebrated.