MULTI-INSTRUMENTALIST, COMPOSER, WRITER, VISUAL ARTIST
Arnaldo Baptista – founder of ground-breaking group Mutantes, solo musician, visual artist, linguist, poet - we all know him in so many guises, one of his talents being an endless capacity for reinvention.
Arnaldo first hit the Brazilian and international headlines as leader of Mutantes, the rock group that were at the centre of the Tropicalia movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Tropicalia transformed the Brazilian music scene, mixing elements of traditional music with experimental compositions and adventurous live performance. The ‘no rules’ Tropicalia philosophy, most famously expressed in their 1968 album Tropicalia: ou Panis et Circensis (Tropicalia: or Bread and Circuses) was a perfect showcase for Arnaldo’s diverse talents. Trained as a classical pianist by his mother the concert artist, Clarice Leite Dias Baptista, he also mastered jazz piano and the double bass alongside his passion for singing and song writing.
Branching out as a solo artist after leaving Mutantes Arnaldo had a magical year in 1974, releasing his album Loki?, still considered one of the masterpieces of Brazilian music, indeed on the album’s 40th anniversary the newspaper O Estado de São Paulo dedicated the cover of its culture section to Loki? Re-released in 2017 on vinyl by Polysom Records the album caused a sensation all over again and was hailed by the newspaper Folha de São Paulo with a centre page spread.
Despite Loki?’s iconic status Arnaldo says his 1981 release Singin’Alone is his favourite solo album – this ‘one man band’ creation as he describes it gave him the ultimate artistic freedom of playing all the instruments, singing most of the tracks in English and producing and overseeing every detail from initial conception to vinyl popping off the press.
In total Arnaldo released six solo albums ranging from Elo Perdido (Lost Link) and the live Faremos Uma Noitada Excelente (We Will Have a Great Night Out), both recorded in 1978, to the 1987 cult Disco Voador (Flying Saucer) and Let it Bed (2004), an oblique nod to The Beatles, one of his abiding musical influences. The Beatles link even became flesh in 2000 when Arnaldo took the stage with Sean Lennon at the Free Jazz Festival in Rio de Janeiro. To complete the list Arnaldo but only released in 2013 is the live Shining’ Alone (1981).
All of Arnaldo’s solo works were released on digital platforms in 2013 and five of the albums became bestsellers in Brazil when released in a boxed compact disc format in 2015. His enduring appeal and ability to span eras and genres is reflected in the fact that 87% of his audience are aged between 17 and 34, a trend that continues to grow.
In 1982 Arnaldo had a serious accident and spent five years in recovery, basing himself in Juiz de Fora city where he still lives until today with his wife, Lucinha Barbosa, whom he calls simply ‘my girl’. This blow, far from derailing his artistic activities, seems only to have intensified and diversified Arnaldo’s creative drive and imagination. He began to paint and draw, delighting in colour and pattern and populating his landscapes with a wild array of humans and animals and pretty much every kind of mythical inbetween combination too. After appearing in a series of collective exhibitions throughout the 1990s Arnaldo had his first solo visual art exhibition, Lentes Magnéticas (Magnetic Lenses), in 2012 – this achieved wide media coverage and was followed by 2014 Exorealismo (Exorealism). His last show was Transmigração (Transmigration) funded by the reknowned Brazilian art sponsors, CAIXA Cultural São Paulo.
Arnaldo Baptista has, time and again, proven himself to be one Brazil’s most lively, courageous and inventive artists. Returning to live solo performance in 2011 after a 30 year break from taking the stage alone he took command of his grand piano, journeying through his muscial portfolio while images of his paintings and collages unfurled on a wide screen behind. It was a bravura performance from an artist who has never been afraid to experiment and push on to, and even beyond, his limits.
The Arnaldo Baptista story (so far) has now been explored in the documentary Loki! Arnaldo Baptista, which features extensive interviews with Arnaldo where he reflects on his life and artistic adventures. The documentary received 14 awards, both in Brazil and overseas though as many fans have pointed out the story is far from over yet and will require a lot more paint, ink and musical notes to continue its tale.
Arnaldo is one of those artists whose work not only represents past achievement but reaches forward into the future, inspiring hope for the sort of generous, creative world we all desire and need to engage with. He achieves this through his belief in music as a living entity that speaks to the soul, a force that is felt in the blood and heartbeat not just as threads of random sound fed into our ears via ever more sophisticated gadgets. Always attuned to the wonders of the natural world it’s unsurprising that Arnaldo created a musical language that embodies freedom, joy and compassion towards all living creatures – after all that’s pretty much his life philosophy.
