“One of the highest points in the history of music,” was how his contemporary defined Caetano Veloso a Hermeto Pascoalcomposer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist, who died on September 13 at age 89. It is a good measure of the admiration with which he was considered by his colleagues, whether from Brazil, Argentina, the United States or from any place in the world to which this indefinable and unfathomable genius reached with his art. So much so that he was known as “o bruxo” (the witch), and the only definition he accepted for what he did was that of “universal music”. The networks were filled with messages of unanimous affection and praise, each person who came across this albino and cross-eyed elf, with long hair and a lush beard, had some anecdote, big or small, that marked their life in some way.
His family wrote: “with serenity and love, we communicate that Hermeto Pascoal made his passage to the spiritual plane, surrounded by his family and his musical companions. At the exact moment of his passage, his Group was on stage, as he would have liked: making sounds and music.”
A tight summary should record that he was born into a very humble family in Canoe Lagoonmunicipality of Arapiracain Alagoasa state in northeastern Brazil, and that the music of that region was always going to be very present in his art. Self-taught, with perfect pitch, he completed his first musical apprenticeship playing in clubs and hotels with the bands of teachers such as Fafa Lemos y cupand his first important sets were Sambrasa Trio y New Quartet (with the latter he recorded a very influential album), both with the percussionist Airto Moreiray Brazilian Octopus.
It is also Airto who takes him to the United States, to play with him and his wife, the singer Flora Purimand also presents it to Miles Davis (At that time Moreira was playing in the trumpeter’s band), who was enchanted by his compositions, to the point of including several in his album. Live Evilfrom 1971. The following year he released his self-titled debut album as a soloist in the United States, and in 1973 he published his first album in his own country, whose title was already a definition, The Free Music of Hermeto Pascoal. He returned to the United States in 1977 to record the historical Slaves Masswhere alongside pigs recorded live in the studio, he plays with musicians ranging from Brazilian expatriates Airto, Flora and Raul de Souzathe Uruguayans Hugo Fattoruso y David Amaroand members of the band Miles and Weather Reportlike Ron Carter, Alphonso Johnson y Chester Thompson.
Another milestone of his international career was his presentation at the Montreux Jazz Festival 1979, where apart from playing with his group (a performance that would be recorded on a double album) he made an improvised appearance with Elis Regina —who also played on the “Brazilian day” of the Festival—, with just piano and voice, which literally amazed the world.
on the disk Lagoa da Canoa, Municipality of Arapiraca (1984) introduces the song of a parrot and performs the unprecedented feat of dubbing with his instrument, in this case a harmonium, the story of a soccer match by a sports writer.
Between the years 1996/97 he wrote the work Sound Calendarat the rate of one song per day, with 366 pieces that would be published along with a book with their respective scores and comments. The idea was to honor everyone who had a birthday in the world, with an extra theme for those who were born in a leap year.
In 2002 he met the singer Aline Morenawho would become his partner, with whom he formed a duo (Chimarrão with Rapadura), who made multiple tours and albums, in duo format, with a group, with a big band and with a symphony orchestra. Even in recent years, Hermeto continued to be active and escape the spotlight. His last album was For you, Ilza (2024), dedicated to his wife from 1954 until her death in 2000, and mother of his six children.
Your relationship with Argentina is a very special chapter. In Imaginary Expressthe magazine where I started in journalism, we had the joke that we had “invented” Hermeto in our country. The joke wasn’t that far from the truth. When three Expreso envoys (Pipo Lernoud, Fernando Basabru and Alfredo Rosso) traveled to the 1978 International Jazz Festival in São Paulo, they were bewitched by its magic and the directors had the absolute audacity to put it on the cover (No. 28, November 1978), when it was completely unknown in our country. This made possible Pascoal’s first visit to Argentina a few months later, where he performed two concerts: one with Dizzy Gillespie in Works—after which he went to play Jazz & Pop for no more than 40 people!—, and another alone with his group at the Teatro El Nacional.
Each encounter with Hermeto was a teaching, his tenderness, humility and immense wisdom permeated each of his gestures, his phrases. I have never found a musician where the double meaning of “play” in English (“play” can be used to execute an instrument or play) was so clear and manifest. Among his favorite instruments (apart from those he mastered virtuously, including keyboards, melodica, saxophones, percussion, guitar, his characteristic bass flute), were a kettle with water, pots of different shapes and sizes, children’s toys, rubber ducks, and whistles. On one of his visits, in La Plata and Rosario, he had a pool set up on the stage, in which he and his musicians got into, causing all kinds of aquatic sounds. The commotion that it caused in La Plata caused the Hermetic Banddedicated to interpreting their repertoire.
Hermeto was music, which flowed from him with astonishing naturalness, and he was also freedom, “the freest musician that exists”, as Luis Salinas once told me. And that was probably one of the reasons for the impact it had on the local public, especially in times of dictatorship, when it forged a relationship that was maintained over time. In times of fierce repression, Hermeto used to end his concerts by going out into the street with musicians and instruments and the entire audience in procession behind him.
Speaking of identity, he told me in a note for the Expreso: “I’m a guy from Brazil, Hermeto Pascoal, Brazilian, but music is universal, it has no limits. I’m going to use music from all the planets and when I die I’m going to go play up there.” Surely, you are already doing it.
