Maria Rita - Segundo 2005

Maria Rita took the MPB world by storm in 2003 with her debut album, winning all kinds of awards and crossing over abroad in light of her mammoth success. The beautiful and beautiful-sounding young lady is the daughter of one of Brazil's most (if not the most) legendary vocalists, the late Elis Regina, and if that alone weren't enough to make her a star in waiting, her father is César Camargo Mariano, one of the country's top arrangers, producers, and pianists, and her namesake is Rita Lee, yet another MPB legend. Add to that a close musical partnership with Milton Nascimento, who penned "A Festa," the opening track of her debut album, and you can see why the MPB world was eagerly awaiting her recording debut.

Born September 19, 1977, in São Paulo, Rita began singing professionally at age 24. Her debut album, Maria Rita, released domestically in late 2003 and internationally in 2004, spawned two big hits, the aforementioned "A Festa" and "Cara Valente." On the heels of the album's blockbuster success -- both critical and commercial -- Rita released a similarly self-titled DVD that captures her 2004 live performance at Bourbon Street in São Paulo. Among the awards won by Rita in 2004 were Latin Grammys for Best New Artist and Best MPB Album. Rita's second album, Segundo (2005), was even more popular than her first (selling over 700,000 copies in Brazil alone), if not as critically acclaimed. A live DVD, Segundo ao Vivo, followed in 2006. Rita's third album, Samba Meu (2007), was a change of style: a collection of acoustic sambas.
Segundo is the second album by Maria Rita, following up on her enormously successful debut album from 2003. Rita undoubtedly is a very talented singer with a great voice. She proved it on her first album and proves it again on Segundo. But after all the huge expectations built up by large sections of the media before this release, you can't help but find it something of an anticlimax. Not that Segundo is a bad album, because it isn't. But it isn't all that great either, especially compared to the work of many other, much less famous Brazilian artists and singers. Dominated by a rather sparse, slightly jazzy MPB sound, Segundo sounds very similar to the previous album, though there is actually less stylistic variation between the songs this time around. However, a couple of tracks stand out from the rest due to their quality. "Caminho das Águas" is a very cute, nice, and gentle piano ballad. The excellent "Mal Intento," sung in Spanish, was written by the famous Uruguayan composer Jorge Drexler. Rita's version of O Rappa's "Minha Alma" also functions very well indeed. Segundo is a tasteful, fine, and classy album, but far from the masterpiece many people would have it be.   AMG.

listen here