An Introduction.

So here I am, little miss Maya Solovéy, a fairly private person in a world where everyone in the arts/entertainment must be very public, at least about their private life. "Everyone must have a blog" it is said. Though I have obviously never blogged before, we all must have our brave moments, and pour our little hearts out into the great endless sea of cyberspace, not knowing, (and perhaps not caring) what befalls them.


But since I am a musician, (a singer-songwriter to be exact) here is a little bit about me, and where I stand musically. Firstly, I write songs in three languages- English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Where am I from? Oddly enough, I was born in Philly, and raised in the little wooden hamlets of Western Massachusetts. Now this is a little nugget of constant confusion. Why, (and how for that matter) would a girl from New England write songs in languages that are not her own. "Are you of Latin birth or heritage?" I am often asked. Wrong again- I am Jewish, of Eastern European decent. Nobody seems to get it. Perhaps I don't even get it. But nonetheless, here's how the story goes.

We were always a well traveled family. That goes without saying. By the time I was 20, I had been to well over 20 countries in most of the continents, some of which when I was younger with my family, some living or travelling on my own. In high school, I had a very strong desire to learn Spanish. So the obvious thing to do was to find a way to live in aSpanish speaking country. I found schools and host family programs, and made my way to Ecuador, then Spain. By my sophomore year of high school, I had already bought a $100 guitar, locked myself in my room for 6 hours, taught myself two chords, and began writing songs. I was writing while living in these countries, but certainly not inSpanish. In fact, I never wrote a tune in Spanish until 3 years ago, 4 years after I had left Spain.
But really, the reason I began writing songs in Spanish at all was not to just have songs in Spanish. It was because I began hearing songs in my head in Portuguese. A month prior, a jazz musician friend of mine, Bob Beldon, had given me a mix CD of João Gilberto and Astrud Gilberto. I listened to it religiously, completely entranced by these sounds of their words and music. It found its way into my very being, and I began hearing songs of my own with these strange sounds.
Now obviously I didn't speak Portuguese. This was a mere detail in my mind. I wrote what I was hearing in Spanish, for some songs as a temporary place holder, knowing that as soon as I could, I would translate many of these into Portuguese. I started going Brazilian dancing every week. I befriended many Brazilian musicians. I found a school way downtown, biked my little self down there twice a week, and studied arduously. I heard a someone was going to be teaching percussion in Bahia, and I booked a ticket immediately.
While in Brazil, at first I was travelling with some jazz musician friends of mine, namely Sergio Brandão, and Richard Bona and his band, while they were touring around Rio de Janeiro. After a few weeks of that, I head out on my own, to the north of Brazil- Bahia.
My first night in Salvador, Bahia, it was pouring. I went to a street where I had read there was a hostel, and there was none. There was ahippyish looking man, who told me the hostel had closed. But he said that he was "staying" in this other closed down hostel next door, and that I could stay there too. So I squatted there with him, until he got expelled from hisCapoeira School a few days later, and peaced out of Bahia and this little abandoned hostel that I had begun to make home. It was not the nicest home, nor the cleanest, nor the safest, but it was home nonetheless. It had not been used in years. Everything was dirty. Not much worked. I found an old shower that somehow, by the grace of god, shed a little cold water now and then. People came in, they made conversation, they stole things. They stole almost everything I had. They still wanted to hang out, grab a beer, and chat. Then they stole more. The only thing they didn't steal was the most important thing to me- a 7-string classical guitar that I had found collecting dust in the back corner of a used guitar shop in Riode Janeiro.
My commitment was strong, if even perhaps a little too much. My family and friends back home were worried about me. Believe me, I was scared too. It's much easier to die in Brazil than in the U.S. They wanted me to come home. I wouldn't. I felt there was something I needed to accomplish there. I studied percussion every day. I met a lady in the street that tutored me inPortuguese. I played the surdo (bass drum) and danced in street festivals and parades and spontaneous happenings. As much struggle, pain, fear, loneliness , and betrayal as there was, there was an equal measure of joy. My heart was filled with life, for the very grain and grit of humanity was all around me. People who had almost nothing would joyfully spend their last dollar on a beer and enjoy the soccer game. They didn't have many material things to bring them happiness, so they had to make it with each other- with a little food and drink, maybe a soccer ball, a couple instruments, and a song and dance.
It was only because of a family emergency that I left, to the relief of my friends and family. I came back very raw. But I had breathed the life of Brazil into my heart, and at the very least, I had learned Portuguese.