Kevin Bronson on October 4th, 2014

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Los Angeles’ Mia Doi Todd has built a vast catalog of art-folk characterized by poetic lyricism, a healthy disregard for genre boundaries, a refined vocal styling and, overall, an intimacy that can only be regarded as fearless. For her 10th album, she tackled the broad topic of nature in the balletic language of Portuguese, covering 10 songs by Brazilian greats such as Caetano Veloso, Joyce, Milton Nascimento, Tom Zé, Tom Jobim, Dorival Caymmi, Candeia, and Dércio Marques. Recorded in March in São Paulo, “Floresta” (or, forest) was made with an all-Brazilian lineup of Fabiano do Nascimento on seven-string nylon guitar, Maurício Takara and Rogério Martins on percussion and Meno del Picchia on bass. You don’t have to know a word of Portuguese to feel the beauty here; Todd caresses every phrase, evoking every possible ounce of joy and sadness. The video for the Milton Nascimento/Ronaldo Bostos song “Cais” is indicative of the album’s countenance. “There is a haunting quality, a constant forward motion and subtle kind of tension in Mia’s ‘Cais,’ contradictory impulses that I wanted to explore with her, as with a character that was traveling through her own changing thoughts, sensations and inner landscape,” director Arnaud Benoliel said of the video. “It was about creating a progression of moods and feelings. The solitude and dreams, despair and hope that this can entail.”

||| Live: Mia Doi Todd performs this evening on the Family Stage at the Eagle Rock Music Festival.

Photo by Alisson Loubeck