Tom Zé

Antônio José Santana Martins (born 11 October 1936), known professionally as Tom Zé , born in Irará, Bahia, is a Brazilian singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer who was influential in the Tropicália movement of 1960s Brazil. After the peak of the Tropicália period, Zé went into relative obscurity: it was only in the 1990s, when musician and Luaka Bop label head David Byrne discovered Zé's 1975 album Estudando o Samba and then released reissues of his work, that Zé returned to performing and releasing new material.

Early life and career Tom Zé grew up in the small town of Irará, Bahia in the dry sertão region of the country's Northeast. He would later claim that his hometown was "pre-Gutenbergian", as information was primarily transferred through oral communication. As a child, he was influenced by Brazilian musicians such as Luiz Gonzaga and Jackson do Pandeiro. Zé became interested in music by listening to the radio, and moved to the state capital of Salvador to pursue a degree. He later relocated to São Paulo and began his career in popular music there.

Career Much of his early work involved his wry impressions of the massive metropolitan area, coming as he did, from a small town in the relatively poor northeast.

Influential in the Tropicália movement, Zé contributed, along with Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Gal Costa, Os Mutantes, and Nara Leão, to the watershed Tropicália album/manifesto Tropicália: ou Panis et Circenses (1968). He also participated in a series of concerts with the musicians. After the Brazilian military government of the 1960s began to crack down on the musicians of Tropicália, Zé moved out of the public eye and began to experiment with novel instruments and composition styles. While the other major figures of Tropicália would go on to great commercial and critical success in later decades, Zé slipped into obscurity in the 1970s and 1980s.

Re-emergence In the early 1990s, Zé's work experienced a revival when American musician David Byrne discovered one of his albums, Estudando o Samba (1976), on a visit to Rio de Janeiro. Zé was the first artist signed to the Luaka Bop label and has so far released a compilation and two albums, all of which received positive reviews from critics in the United States. He has collaborated with many of the concrete poets of São Paulo, including Augusto de Campos, and employed concrete techniques in his lyrics. Musically, his work appropriates samba, Bossa Nova, Brazilian folk music, forró, and American rock and roll, among others. He has been praised by avant-garde composers for his use of dissonance, polytonality, and unusual time signatures. Because of the experimental nature of many of his compositions, Zé has been compared with American musicians such as Frank Zappa and Captain Beefheart.

One of his last efforts, though, has been a return to Bossa Nova, his Estudando a Bossa – Nordeste Plaza. Says Zé: "That music has inhabited my psyche for 50 to 60 years. Familiar and profound, yet somehow extraterrestrial in my mind. It had to come out, to be dealt with."

Discography Studio albums and collaborations 1968: Grande Liquidação 1970: Tom Zé 1972: Se o Caso É Chorar 1973: Todos os Olhos 1976: Estudando o Samba 1978: Correio da Estação do Brás 1984: Nave Maria 1992: Brazil Classics, Vol. 5: The Hips of Tradition 1997: Parabelo (with Zé Miguel Wisnik) 1998: Com Defeito de Fabricação 1999: Postmodern Platos 2000: Jogos de Armar 2002: Santagustin (with Gilberto Assis) 2003: Imprensa Cantada 2005: Estudando o Pagode – Na Opereta Segregamulher e Amor 2006: Danç-Êh-Sá 2008: Danç-Êh-Sá Ao Vivo (live) 2008: Estudando a Bossa – Nordeste Plaza 2009: O Pirulito Da Ciência – Tom Zé & Banda Ao Vivo 2012: Tropicália Lixo Lógico 2014: Vira Lata na Via Láctea 2016: Canções Eróticas de Ninar 2017: Sem Você Não A 2022: Língua Brasileira

Compilations and box-sets 1990: Brazil Classics, Vol. 4: The Best of Tom Zé - Massive Hits 1999: 20 Preferidas 2000: Série Dois Momentos (vols. 1, 2, and 15) 2010: Studies of Tom Zé: Explaining Things So I Can Confuse You (box-set of "Brazil Classics, Vol. 4", "Estudando o Pagode", "Estudando A Bossa Nordeste Plaza" and live performances)