É o Que a Casa Oferece

Having relocated to Los Angeles in 2010, Brazilian musician Gabriel da Rosa turned into a DJ that introduced his country's rich musical history to a larger Californian audience. And as it so often happens with immigrants, he began feeling a call and a deeper connection to his homeland's main musical expressions – samba and bossa nova. Hence, he started writing his own compositions on the shoulders of giants such as João Gilberto, Luiz Bonfá, Cartola and Tom Jobim.

Da Rosa does a fine job and his voice has a fragility that suits the melancholic quality of his chord progressions, but it is hard for someone in the 21st century to add something worthy of celebration while picking up on bossa nova's weary material. Especially because da Rosa is no exceptional singer and no genius lyricist. It makes É o Que a Casa Oferece a good enough record to entertain an evening between friends (no problem there), but while it delivers some interesting arrangements – the strings and reeds in ‘So You Can See Me’ or the more exploratory ‘Interlude (That's a Shame)’ deserve a good listen – it's not something you will remember the next day. Maybe when da Rosa learns to deal with his saudade for Brazil, the music will do it too. Right now, it feels somewhat imprisoned by it.