Joyce Moreno June 29, 2010

“One of the greatest singers of all time!” – Antonio Carlos Jobim

JOYCE (a.k.a. JOYCE MORENO) is one of the great musical treasures of Brazil. As jazz singer, composer and guitarist hailing from Rio de Janeiro, homeland of the Bossa Nova, JOYCE is a sophisticated urbanite bred in Rio’s fertile jazz/samba scene whose sound mellifluously combines Brazilian rhythms, jazz harmonies and intelligent lyrics.

Considered as “one of the greatest singers of all time” by Antonio Carlos Jobim, Joyce began her career in the late sixties and has since toured the world performing at prestigious international jazz festivals all over Europe and Japan. She has recorded in many countries other than Brazil, such as the US, Germany and Japan. Her music has also become very popular in the last few years among younger audiences and DJs, with the re-pressing of many of her early albums.

Three times nominated for a Latin Grammy (2000, 2004, 2005), JOYCE has written over 400 songs, most of them performed in classic recordings by such great stars as Milton Nascimento, Elis Regina, Gal Costa, Maria Bethania, Flora Purim, Wallace Roney, Jon Lucien, Jon Hendricks, Gerry Mulligan, David Sanchez, Juanes, Sergio Mendes and many, many others.

Among the international stars that have been featured on her albums are US jazz musicians Joe Lovano, Kenny Werner, Mulgrew Miller and Renee Rosnes, Norwegian ‘nu-jazz’ star, keyboardist Bugge Wesseltoft and Brazilian greats like Dori Caymmi, Caetano Veloso, Chico Buarque and João Donato. She also has a still unreleased
album produced and arranged by German maestro Claus Ogerman.

In the early 1990’s her music became a favorite among DJs worldwide, bringing her work to a young and enthusiastic new audience.

In 1997, she released her book “Fotografei Voce na Minha Rolleiflex”, a collection of essays on Brazilian music and its characters in the last 30 years. In 1999/ 2002 she created and hosted a TV show of her own, “Cantos do Rio”, a 30 program series about the music and the great musicians of her hometown, Rio de Janeiro.

Some of her songs have been used in Hollywood movies, such as “The Player” (by Robert Altman) and the blockbuster “Legally Blonde”. She also composed the soundtrack for the 2006 short movie “Penalty”, by Spanish director Anna Martinez.

Many compilations on her now over-40-years career have been recently released, and among those, perhaps the most comprehensive is “The Essential Joyce - 1970/1996”, put together by British label Mr. Bongo. Her latest releases for London-based label Far Out Recordings have had a huge worldwide press covering and have been praised by UK press as “sublime… a reinvention of the bossa genre”.

In 2008 she curated, directed and performed at a huge concert that paid tribute to the Bossa-Nova 50th Anniversary at the Barbican Hall in London, featuring three generations of bossa artists, for an audience of over 2,000 people.

Her latest releases in the past 5 years include the DVD “Banda Maluca Ao Vivo” (Biscoito Fino, 2005); “Rio-Bahia”, with Dori Caymmi (Far Out, 2005); and the instrumental album “Samba-Jazz & Outras Bossas”, with Tutty Moreno (Far Out, 2007). A CD/DVD, with her songbook performed live with different guests, has been released by EMI-Brazil in 2008.

2009 has seen four simultaneous new Joyce releases worldwide, including: “Celebrating Jobim’, with the WDR Big Band (Omagatoki/Japan, and Caracalla/Germany); “Visions of Dawn – the 1976 Paris sessions” also featuring Nana Vasconcelos and Mauricio Maestro (Far Out Recordings, UK); “Slow Music”, a ballad album (Biscoito Fino, Brasil); “Aquarius’, with Joao Donato, based on their original repertoire (Toy’s Factory, Japan).