Marco Castillo's mission to introduce Winnipeg to the music of Brazil

They love the rhythms, they love the poetry, they love everything about Brazil. I feel very proud. I feel like I have a big responsibility to keep showing the audience this great music.

—Marco Castillo, musician

It's a long way from Rio de Janeiro to Winnipeg. But Brazilian musician Marco Castillo made the move six years ago and he's never looked back.

Castillo's second album, Trip to Brazil, recorded and produced in Winnipeg by Castillo himself, just won the World Recording of the Year at the Western Canadian Music Awards. He's celebrating by throwing a concert at the Park Theatre on October 21.

The album is a sumptuous collection of sambas in different styles, mostly his original tunes. He also includes sambas by Brazilian composers like Gilberto Gil, Joao Bosco and Djavan. As the matter of fact, Castillo is determined to introduce listeners to more of the great composers of Brazil. So at his upcoming show he'll play music by lots of new names to us, like Hermeto Pascoal, for example, who Castillo calls a genius.

"They are part of my background," he explains."I feel very influenced by this music. All these composers, they are brilliant.

"The idea is to bring a new perspective about Brazil. Because when people think about Brazilian music, they think of (Antonio Carlos) Tom Jobim or Carnaval -- with all that crazy upbeat music, which is a fun thing -- but you have so much great music down there and I really want to show this."



Marco Castillo decided to bring his family to Winnipeg in 2006 partly because of the level of violence in Brazil. "We have too much in Rio de Janeiro," he says. "It's crazy to live there. I lost friends, I lost family because of the violence. Of course we have violence here, but nothing compared with a city of 12 million people."