Gal Costa

“Baroque samba in a silk dress, with a revolution humming beneath”

Let’s be honest: when an artist drops a tribute album, the alarm bells go off. Is it filler? Nostalgia bait? A reverent yawn? But Aquarela do Brasil isn’t that. It’s Gal Costa sauntering through the gilded halls of Ary Barroso’s musical empire—in stilettos and feathers—and whispering: “I’ll make this mine.”

This album isn’t just samba. It’s samba seduced, samba reimagined, samba made strange and new. Gal doesn’t cover these songs—she possesses them. They emerge not as museum pieces but as reincarnated spirits in glittering, slightly haunted drag. “Camisa Amarela” doesn’t smile; it smirks. “Na Baixa do Sapateiro” aches with the kind of longing that makes you light a cigarette in the rain.

This is an album you can play for your grandmother and your Marxist literature professor—though only one of them will catch the subversive twitch in Gal’s phrasing. It’s a samba album, sure. But it’s also an exorcism, a love letter, and a warning.