Fabiana Cozza

Fabiana Cozza dos Santos (born 16 January 1976) is a Brazilian singer, writer, researcher, and interpreter. She is considered one of the "best of her generation" and "the best Brazilian performer of today", being compared to Elis Regina, Elizeth Cardoso, and Clara Nunes.

She began her career in the middle of the 1990s, becoming a member of group led by singer . She released her first solo studio album in 2004. In 2024, she was nominated for the 2024 Brazilian Music Awards for best interpreter.

Cozza graduated with a degree in popular music, musical theory, and group practice by the Universidade Livre de Música Tom Jobim (now Emesp) and with a degree in journalism from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo (PUC-SP), along with a master's degree in speech–language pathology from PUC-SP and is currently pursuing a doctorate in music from the State University of Campinas (Unicamp).

Biography Cozza was born in São Paulo on 16 January 1976. She is the firstborn child of one of the showmen of São Paulo-based samba school Camisa Verde e Branco, Oswaldo dos Santos, and teacher Maria Inês Cozza dos Santos. Her father has Black and Indigenous ancestry, while her mother has Italian and Portuguese ancestry. Oswaldo dos Santos is the son of a man of Black and Indigenous background and a Black woman from the city of Conquista, in the state of Minas Gerais. Fabiana's paternal grandmother always worked in the family's home, washing and selling clothes to sustain her son's studies, who would become one of the most well-known interpreters of samba-enredo in São Paulo's carnaval scene. Fabiana's mother, Maria Inês Cozza dos Santos, is of Italian and Portuguese background, whose ancestors emigrated after abolition of slavery in Brazil as the government recruited Europeans to emigrate and work on coffee plantations.

She then began to receive considerable attention due to Nassif's article. She would develop, as a recently discovered artist, a cult following, though she would only perform on Mondays.

The year after, Cozza launched the DVD version of “Quando o Céu Clarear”, the result of her practicing contemporary dance and with direction made in conjunction with Jorge Balbyns. The DVD includes as participants Maria Rita and Rappin' Hood.

After giving tribute to some of the great composers of samba in her first three albums, she made her fourth project an ode exclusively to Clara Nunes.

After the work received good critical reception for her work, Cozza was invited to participate in a collection with 18 other writers, along with names such as Itamar Vieira, Jeferson Tenório, Marcelino Freire, and Nei Lopes. In the collection, titled “Contos de Axé”, she writes about the story of Xangô. Along with these, she still also commits herself to her studies, habits from which she took from her father. In 2020, she graduated with a master's degree in speech-language pathology from PUC-SP and is currently taking doctorate courses in music at Unicamp.

Cozza, while still widely considered a famous samba singer, also has always desired to expand beyond Brazil to be in contact with other Black people throughout Latin America This came into fruition through “Ay, Amor!” (2015), a piece of musical theatre in homage to the Cuban pianist Bola de Nieve, made in conjunction with Pepe Cisneros. The work received the “Best Album in a Foreign Language" award from the Brazilian Music Awards in 2018.

Along with this, she has been expanding her presence at music festivals in other parts of the world, such as Israel, Germany, France, Canada, the United States, Bulgaria, Chile, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Cuba, Mozambique, and Cape Verde. As an extension of her work, she also developed studies and orientations for singers, actors, and people interested in discovering their artistic expression through their voice, with the “O Corpo da Voz" organization. More recently, she went on to participate at tables, workshops, symposiums, and projects about voicework, interpretation, Afro-Brazilian culture, and Black entrepreneurism and curation. She was the artistic curator for Ocupação Cartola, during Itaú Cultural 2016.

Discography

2004 - O Samba é Meu Dom 2007 - Quando o Céu Clarear 2011 - Fabiana Cozza 2013 - Canto Sagrado - Ao Vivo 2015 - Partir 2017 - Ay Amor! 2019 - Canto da Noite na Boca do Vento 2020 - Dos Santos