Celebrating 25 years of their partnership, Orlando Haddad and Patricia King released a new Minas album. Unlike previous albums, which featured guest musicians, this time Orlando and Patricia are the main focus in all tracks playing the guitar (Orlando), piano (Patricia) and sharing vocals, production, arrangements as well as writing nearly all new tracks for the album.

As the album name implies, this is a Bossa Nova cd. Unlike other Bossa albums, though, here we find originals songs with strong appeal, swing and performances. It's a celebration of the genre done very well. Natural elements of Bossa music are present but without the trite approaches. The title track, for example, talks about dreams of summer days while driving along. Common threads of smiles, laughter and love permeate this lovely tune and directly asserts that Bossa is in the air. Patricia's piano and Orlando's guitar solos form a serene partnership setting the mood for even better things to come. Their vocal duos are very uniform but not monotonous. They compliment each other's timbres. At times, Orlando's guitar strumming evokes sounds of other Bossa classics as in "The Guitarist," but the resemblance is only temporary. His guitar mastery is solid and only comparable to his singing strength with soothing vocals. Listen to "Temporal" and you can experience both guitar and singing skills in one song. The lyrics in "Temporal" provide you a trip to Rio de Janeiro complete with romance and Carnaval. This samba gives you excitement for all senses.

Patricia's voice is another amazing asset in this powerful duo. Her light and delicate articulation transforms simple words in strong messages. Take, for example, the inquisitive "Hourglass." The longing in her voice quite well translates the message in these beautiful lyrics culminating with the question "Will you give your love tomorrow."

The only track that was not originally written for the album is penned by Orlando's brother, Rui Haddad. Orlando tells me that he and his brother wrote the tune in 1972, when they were students in Rio de Janeiro. In one of those life-changing moments, they wrote the song in about 10 minutes but never recorded it. The lyrics talk about a beautiful and hospitable woman living in an enchanted forest. She dreams of peaceful days in her house under the big tree canopy. While the world is at war, Dona Flor takes her message around disguising herself as yellow smoke until her message is heard and peace is restored. When peace is back, she dresses herself in white lilies. After finishing the song, the brothers Haddad realized Dona Flor was actually their mother. So, this song is dedicated to Ms. Rosa Haddad. The melody itself is like a lullaby.

Though each song tells a distinct story that captivates the listener, two love songs stand out in this fine collection: "Seasons of Our Love" and "All in Vain." While the former is an ode to growing love, the latter questions whether all one experienced in an ending love affair was all in vain. "Fragments to piece together, times to remember, for all I have today is yesterday," the song goes. Beautiful poetry!

You can read more about the artists and listen to their music at Minas.

E.L.