Whoa...nearly a year has gone by!!!!

Can't believe there have been no entries since last February or so. Time flies....

It's been a busy year. Your SambaMaster went to Rio to check things out, heard lots of great music, lots of samba, ate way too much great food, and managed to find a wonderful piece of art for the 2010 Carnaval poster. It is by a terrific artist named Vitorino whose work I've admired since 1999. About that time I talked to him about doing a poster, but things just never worked out. Until this year when I saw one of his paintings, and instantly knew it would make a great poster. (here is the URL for my blog entry on finding the painting: http://sambamaster.blogspot.com/2009/10/home-again-home-again-not-quite.html )

Anyway, hope you like it. It is VERY different, for sure, but I just felt we needed a change, so we get a totally different, but very Brazilian style, and our first horizontal poster. It's for sale in the gallery, at Ana Brasil on Rockwood Lane, and will soon be at Waterloo Records and other places.

Am happy to report Grupo Saveiro or Beleza Brazil as they now like to be called, will be back, once again featuring the fantastically charismatic singer Marianne Ebert who was with the group this year. Should be a great performance now that she knows Austin is a serious party town. I think she was taken by surprise in 2009. Make her welcome again!

We'll have an even better light setup...this year was the best ever. We'll outdo that in '10!

And the Austin Samba School, Acadêmicos da Ópera will be back bigger and better as well...

Here is a report from the SchoolMaster, Mr. Jacare:

"We did our first, pan-Samba School run through last night and the show is really professional quality. We'll keep running twice through/rehearsal till C. Brasileiro. Your guests have never seen anything like this. Very exciting.

In addition, I have a guy from Stomp helping me with some new arrangements and in fleshing out the existing Bahian stuff. This guy was the go-to soloist on djembe in Stomp. "Monster" is not really sufficient to describe him. In addition, I have several ritimistas who have risen to leadership level. They circulate in the bateria, bringing the groove to a new level. The rehearsals are finally starting to be exactly like rehearsals in Brazil. I'm taking them to Rio in January so it's only going to get better.

All that to say that you are going to absolutely love the show this year. Space Opera. Get your jet pack out."

So, stay tuned for more developments. We'll announce a couple of pre-Carnaval events to help fill in the space between New Year's and our party. If you are not on the mailing list, sign up here: http://www.sambaparty.com/maillist/?p=subscribe

And join our Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/carnavalbrasileiro.austin

Will be back soon!