João Donato

Throughout the evolution of bossa nova and Brazilian jazz, João Donato exerted profound influence as a pianist, composer, and arranger who issued more than three dozen albums under his own name while amassing thousands of additional credits. Across successive generations he partnered with nearly every major Brazilian musician of either gender and extended his reach to Latin music figures such as Mongo Santamaria and Tito Puente; he also performed on trombone with Eddie Palmieri’s La Perfecta. Because domestic outlets for his exploratory bossa style proved scarce, he relocated to the United States, where The New Sound of Brazil and Sambou Sambou appeared. The landmark 1970 release A Bad Donato, an early jazz-funk milestone that included and inspired Deodato, followed. In 1974 Donato assumed musical direction of Gal Costa’s international Cantar production, an experience that acquainted him with younger Brazilian artists who would later serve as collaborators, among them Marcos Valle on Quem É Quem that same year and Gilberto Gil on the 1975 album Lugar Comum. After a decade spent arranging, composing, and producing, he delivered the live recording Leiliadas in 1986, then observed another ten-year hiatus before the widely praised Coisas Tao Simples surfaced in 1995 to signal his return. Regular recording resumed in 2000; he joined Joyce Moreno for Tudo Bonito and revisited the partnership on 2009’s Aquarius. The forward-looking synthesis of jazz, bossa, funk, and electronics that constituted Donato Elétrico arrived in 2016, and in 2021 he worked with Americans Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge on JID007.

Donato’s earliest keyboard experience came with a miniature accordion that he mastered at age six. School introduced him to trombone, an instrument he would later employ on recordings, and on his eleventh birthday his father presented him with a full-size accordion. That same year, 1945, his father’s transfer from Rio Branco in Acre to Rio de Janeiro led to formal piano lessons for the boy.

By fifteen Donato was already earning wages as an accordionist at suburban dances. His initial recording, a 78 rpm disc for the Star label alongside Altamiro Carrilho e Seu Regional, dates from this time, though his name does not appear on the label. At sixteen he joined violinist Fafá Lemos’s ensemble and participated in jam sessions at Rio’s influential Sinatra-Farney Fan Club, a circle frequented by jazz musicians, producers, and writers.

April 1953 brought his debut 78 rpm EP under the name João Donato e Seu Conjunto on Sinter, featuring instrumental trio renditions of American and Brazilian songs. That July he assembled Os Namorados from the remnants of Os Modernistas and Namorados da Lua, releasing the single “Eu Quero Um Samba,” which introduced the bossa nova rhythm.

In 1955 Donato played accordion on guitarist Luiz Bonfa’s self-titled debut, where Tom Jobim served as pianist, and with longtime associate João Gilberto he wrote the bossa standard “Minha Saudade.” The following year he issued his first full-length album, Chá Dançante on Odeon, produced by Jobim, then moved from Rio to São Paulo, where he performed with Os Copacabanas and the Luís César Orchestra while maintaining his own trio.

During this period Donato often played at the Copacabana Palace with Copinha’s orchestra and conversed there with the attentive Gilberto. In 1958 he recorded Dance Conosco, which contained two co-compositions with Gilberto: the mambo “Mambinho” and the sambas “Minha Saudade” and “The Frog.”

At twenty-five in 1959, Donato and his groups found themselves unwelcome in virtually every São Paulo nightclub; his modern, swinging piano style proved too challenging for dancers and too advanced for fellow musicians. Club owners permitted him to perform only after 4:00 a.m., once most patrons had departed, and repeated complaints eventually led to an outright ban. He began offering to play without compensation simply to refine his technique, yet the circumstances prompted his decision to emigrate to the United States.

A friend who had toured Mexico with singer Elizete Cardoso and settled in the western United States invited Donato for a two-week engagement; instead he remained thirteen years. Word of his modernist harmonies and rhythmic sophistication spread rapidly among Latin musicians, who soon sought him for live work and sessions. He appeared on Arriba! with Mongo Santamaria (Fantasy, 1961), Vaya Puente with Tito Puente (Philips, 1962), At the Black Hawk with Santamaria (Fantasy, 1962), The Astrud Gilberto Album and Shadow of Your Smile with Astrud Gilberto (Verve, 1964 and 1965), and Brazil! Brazil! Brazil! with Bud Shank (World Pacific, 1965). Two solo projects also emerged: The New Sound of Brazil for RCA, containing “Amazonas,” later covered by Chris Montez, “A Rã,” co-written with a young Caetano Veloso, and “Caranguejo,” recorded by Sérgio Mendes—each becoming a major hit for its interpreter—and Sambou Sambou on Pacific Jazz. In 1968 he recorded The Prophet and Solar Heat with Cal Tjader and contributed to Sérgio Mendes’ Favorite Things alongside fellow Brazilians Moacir Santos and Dom Um Romao, who would shortly join Weather Report.

The 1969 session Donato/Deodato for Muse, though unreleased until 1973, presented a classic meeting of Latin jazz and bossa nova. In 1970 he completed A Bad Donato for Blue Thumb, produced by percussionist Emil Richards and featuring an extensive cast of American and Brazilian players including bassist Ron Carter, Conte Candoli, Bud Shank, Ernie Watts, Oscar Castro-Neves, and Dom Um Romao; the album became a jazz-funk benchmark.

Donato returned to Brazil in 1972 and recorded Quem É Quem for Odeon the following year. In 1973 he played and sang on Dom Um Romao’s self-titled Muse debut. The next year he directed Gal Costa’s touring production and documented it on the live album Cantar; Costa included three of his compositions, among them “A Ra” performed as a duet with Veloso. The engagement acquainted many younger Brazilian artists with Donato’s rigorous yet unorthodox methods, fostering a sense of kinship. In 1975 he recorded Lugar Comum with Gilberto Gil supplying harmony vocals throughout. Despite favorable reception in Brazil and Europe, another decade elapsed before Donato again recorded as a leader.

He spent the remainder of the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s working with Brazilian and American artists as pianist, composer, arranger, singer, or producer. In 1976 he arranged half of Costa’s Gal Canta Caymmi and served as session pianist and musical director. The following year he shared piano duties with Joe Sample on Michael Franks’ Sleeping Gypsy and held the keyboard chair for Stanley Clarke’s Bass Player. In 1978 he produced numerous Brazilian vocal recordings and played piano on Milton Nascimento’s Clube Da Esquina 2 as well as electric piano on João Bosco’s samba-funk album Linha de Passe. In 1979 he contributed percussion throughout Moacir Santos’ Opus 3 No. 1.

Early in the 1980s Donato maintained an active schedule with Brazilian colleagues. He composed material and played piano on Yana Purim’s self-titled RCA debut in 1982. The next year he participated in guitarist-composer Vinicius Cantuária’s first two EMI albums, Gávea de Manhã and Siga-Me. Also in 1983, Fontana released the compilation O Prestígio de João Donato, surveying his 1950s and 1960s work. In 1986 a live performance appeared on Elektra Musician as Leilíadas, yet another ten years would pass before further leader dates. In 1987 he played grand piano on Purim’s Harvest Time—the sole acoustic pianist on the session—while Herbie Hancock, Dave Matthews, and Deodato handled synthesizers and clavinets; the set included a reading of Donato’s and sister Lysias Ênio’s “Amazonas.” In 1989 he supplied arrangements and piano to Robertinho Silva’s Bodas de Prata and continued performing with his own groups Brazil, Europe, and Asia.

Japanese-Brazilian singer and guitarist Lisa Ono devoted her 1995 album Minha Saudade entirely to interpretations of his compositions; Donato arranged the project, performed percussion, trombone, and piano, and sang on it as well. The following year he resumed regular recording with the acclaimed Coisas Tao Simples on Odeon and followed in 1997 with Café com Pão, a collaboration with drummer Eloir de Morais on Almir Chediak’s Lumiar Discos. He closed the century with the Jobim tribute Só Danço Samba, which he curated, arranged, and conducted while playing piano with a septet.

Donato opened the new century with Tudo Bonito, a co-billed project with Joyce Moreno on which they wrote four songs together; Donato contributed harmony vocals and electric piano alongside reed and wind masters Paulo Moura and Teco Cardoso, drummer Tutty Moreno, and bassist Rodolfo Stroeter. In 2001 he recorded the Arnaldo DeSouteiro-produced Here’s That Rainy Bossa Day as co-billed performer with Palmyra & Levita for Jazz Station Records, issued the Brazilian jazz-bossa overview Remando Na Raia on Luminar Discos, and released Ê Lalá Lay-Ê on Deckdisc, an eleven-track collection of songs co-written with sister Lysias Ênio; Donato arranged, sang, and played keyboards with a large ensemble and backing vocalists. In 2002 he issued Managarroba, another set of originals written primarily with Ênio, followed by the globally celebrated Wanda Sá with João Donato in 2003. The fourteen-track album contained only his compositions, performed by a quintet featuring Sá on vocals and acoustic guitar, Silva on drums and percussion, Jamil Joanes on bass, and J.T. Meirelles on reeds; Donato handled piano and arrangements. A similar session, Encontra João Donato by Emílio Santiago, appeared the same year on Luminar Discos with Silva and Joanes among its large cast. In 2004, JSR in association with Japan’s Rambling Records released Lucy in the Sky with Bossa Diamonds, a collaboration with Palmyra & Levita offering radically rearranged selections from Brazilian and British pop as well as the Great American Songbook. The following year Germany’s Whatmusic issued A Blue Donato, a previously unreleased live jazz set from 1973.

In 2005 Donato released his first concert DVD on Biscoito Fino; Donatural featured guest vocalists Leila Pinheiro, Joyce, Emílio Santiago, Angela Rô Rô, and Gilberto Gil alongside his road band. In April 2006 the government of Acre honored him by naming its new modern arts campus “Usina de Artes e Comunicação João Donato”; he and Gil performed at the ceremony.

The pianist rejoined Moura for Dois Panos Para Manga, then issued the solo O Piano de João Donato on Deckdisc in 2007. In 2008 he reunited with Joyce for Aquarius, which the leaders co-arranged with an all-star cast of Brazilian session players. In 2009 Biscoito Fino released an audio-only version of Donatural, followed in 2010 by Água, a collaboration with vocalist Paula Morelenbaum. Universal Music issued a re-recorded edition of Sambolero featuring the original album tracks performed by two different trios between 1995 and 2001.

Donato devoted subsequent years to live performance, writing, arranging, and production. His 2013 appearance at the thirtieth anniversary of Rio’s Festival Jazzmania was released by Discobertas the next year as Live Jazz in Rio, Vol 1 – O Couro Ta Comendo! The 2016 album Donato Elétrico, a fluid, entirely electric blend of jazz-funk, lithe samba, and bossa, earned widespread acclaim, received a Latin Grammy nomination for Best Instrumental Album, and was selected by the Brazilian edition of Rolling Stone as one of the year’s finest Brazilian releases. He followed with Sintetizamor on Polysom, a high-energy electronic jazz-disco outing recorded with Donatinho that Rolling Stone Brasil likewise named among 2017’s best albums. After a period devoted to live appearances and arrangements for other artists, he re-emerged in the United States in June 2021 through the collaboration with Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad on the series João Donato JID007. João Donato died on July 17, 2023, of pneumonia. He was 88.