Presentation by Daniel Schvetz , Argentine pianist and composer:

"To talk about this new work and proposal from Espírito Nativo, a project born from the hands of Jacqueline and Rui, it is necessary to remember the 70s, a time when all countries from Mexico southward, including Brazil, had military governments. This is not the place to discuss the various causes, but the fact is that it generated an important counterculture movement."

Tropicalismo in Brazil (especially Chico Buarque de Holanda, Caetano Veloso, Maria Bethânia, among others), the New Cuban Trova and, in parallel, what in Argentina, Uruguay and Chile was called the "Proyección Folklórica" are based on fusion, a real and living fusion, in which the genetic elements of the different characteristic rhythms, both in the harmonic component and in the timbral component, in the text, in the suggestion proper to each expression, maintained their characteristics, but with slight changes in aspect.

We talk about the Venezuelan Joropo, the Brazilian Samba and Bossa Nova, the Chilean, Bolivian and Argentine Cuecas, the Huayno (so interestingly treated by the Chilean groups Quilapayún or Inti-Illimani), the Chacarera, Zamba or Carnavalito in Argentina with “Chango” Farías Gómez or with Cuchi Leguizamón, or the splendid Mexican Amparo Ochoa or the group Los Folklorists.

And it is precisely this mark, that of "Fusion," that presents itself to us in an impactful way in this new album, Terra Mestiça, with special care, it must be said, in the text, in the word, whether spoken, and in various forms, with immense and true "modulations," both expressive and timbral, in a pendulum-like fashion from Spanish to Portuguese, then to almost-Creole and back, now to Castilian...

When we listen to Drume Negrito, the figure of Bola de Nieve comes to mind, that immense and irreplaceable interpreter of diverse Cuban aesthetics; the vocal arrangements in Menino do Bairro Negro sometimes lead us to the transparent sounds of the Brazilian MPB4, flowing harmonies that never interfere with the discourse. It will be difficult not to remember “Los Folkloristas,” reference interpreters of the Mexican 70s/80s, in La Llorona, with a serene and genuine nostalgia. Finally, that atmosphere and world of so-called Andean music, mysterious, sometimes traversed and mistreated, will certainly not be the case here; the Charango says what it has to say, with sounds of unfathomable heights and landscapes, “Que expandes tu canto en la puna...” mysterious Puna, of Carnavales, Huaynos and Chayas, the words in Castilian spoken musically in a sincere and heartfelt way.