NPR Music - Alt.Latino: Tim, The Beatles and all of Brazil

Episode Date: October 7, 2026

The music of Tim Bernardes fits as easily in the poetry of the cosmos as it does in the songwriting canon of his country. Brazil has a legacy of some of the greatest most intricate, emotional songwriting there is, and if you ask me, I’d argue Tim fits right into it. So, I invited him in to play a Tiny Desk for our annual El Tiny takeover. And, of course, I took the opportunity to pull him into the studio after – I absolutely needed to know what he’s been listening to. So, here we are again playing my latest and greatest new game: a special version of our typical guest DJ episode, where I ask them to recall different parts of their lives and themselves through music. No prepared songs or ideas. Let’s call this episode a musical tapestry painted by one of the greatest Brazilian singer-songwriters of this era.  - Anamaria SayreArtists and songs mentioned in this episode:- The Beatles, 'I Want To Hold Your Hand'- Os Mutantes, 'Caminhante Noturno'- Milton Nascimento, 'Nuvem Cigana'- Nelson Cavaquinho, 'Eu E As Flores'- Gilberto Gil, 'Luzia Luluza'- Antônio Carlos Jobim, 'Saudade Do Brasil,' 'O Boto'- Caetano Veloso, 'Minha Mulher'- Tim Bernardes, 'Realmente Lindo'This podcast episode was produced by Noah Caldwell. Suraya Mohamed is the executive producer of NPR Music.Support public media with NPR+ and enjoy perks for over 25 podcasts like this one. This show’s perks include bonus episodes and sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Okay, so after you say what you're going to know that you need to say, you're going to say let the chisme begin, okay? Let the what begin? This is going to go great. Okay. Okay, ready? From Empire Music, this is Alt Latino. I'm Tim Bernardo. And I'm Anna.

Is that it? Yeah. Let the chis may begin. Let the chis may begin. The cheese? The cheese. It's Spanish. You speak Portuguese.

Yeah. The problem. It's not a problem. It's a great problem to have. Chisme. It means like gossip. What is that word in Portuguese? Fofoca. Fofoca. Now you're animated. Okay. Let's the fofoka begin. Let the fofoka begin. Yeah. Now we're talking.

The music of Tim Bernardes fits as easily in the poetry of the cosmos as it does in the songwriting canon of his country. Brazil has a legacy of some of the greatest, most intricate, emotional songwriting. there is. And if you ask me, I'd argue Tim fits right in. So obviously, I invited him to play a tiny desk for our annual L. Tiny Takeover. And of course, I took the opportunity to pull him in after the show. I absolutely needed to know what he's been listening to. So here we are again playing my latest and greatest new game. Let's call this episode a musical tapestry, painted by one of the greatest Brazilian singer-songwriters of this era.

So you have some of my favorite music. It's true. I'm not even just saying that. Really, I love your music. And I would imagine some of my favorite music taste. I think sometimes you listen to artists and you just know that they have excellent, excellent music taste. Let's see. So I was like, well, obviously, if I'm just.

I'm going to have Tim here. I want to play with him my game. Okay, what's your game? So my game is we have these types of shows. They're called guest DJ shows where we bring in an artist. And my co-worker, Felix, who co-hosts this show, he likes to give people a chance to come in prepared. I don't like to do that. Because I think it's more fun when you don't know what's coming. So like when I'm going back home, I feel like, oh, I should have said that song. You're like, ah, no, if I'd only known in advance and I told me. Exactly. Okay.

So that's what we're going to do today. So I'm going to ask you some questions, and then you're going to tell me the song that you think works for that question. Okay. All right. Okay. First question. What is the first song you ever remember hearing?

Something from that red collection of the Beatles, like the early days Beatles. So something like, I want to hold your hand, some song from that era. Nice. I tell you something. I think you'll understand. Say that something.

Those harmonies, man. Yes. What were they doing? This is so good, right? You know it's good, but if you play it and listen, it's always surprisingly better. It's always surprisingly better, right? I don't want to say that we forget about the Beatles,

but we a little bit forget about the Beatles. I mean, because a memory of a song is not a song that is currently playing. You know what I mean? Oh, I really need to think about that. Like, think about this song. I want to hold your hand. But it's different if we play it again right now, the feeling of a song that is currently playing, the present.

You remembering that a song exists isn't going to give you the feeling the song gives you. Yeah, yeah, that's it. Oh. Many bands, I feel like this. Like, if someone say, like, let's listen to Lad Zeppelin. I feel like, oh, I don't want to listen. But if they play it, I feel like, oh, my God, this is incredible. Right, because you're like, you get the feeling of like, oh, I've heard this a million times,

but then it still hits on the millionth time, which is why they're, quote, timeless. Yeah, yeah, yeah. How often do you think about the Beatles? Oh, every day. many times. Okay, moving on. What was the song you first heard that really got you inspired to write your own music? Well, maybe I think what really blew my mind when I was realizing I was going to be a musician

was Osmutanschis, the Brazilian band, Osmutanschis from the 60s. They're like, they are my favorite band, even more than the Beatles, actually. I think that they get everything the Beatles, mixed and they mixed it with all the tropicalia and the Brazilian stuff. And they're from San Paulo. I can relate to that a lot. Very creative, very crazy kids. I love Us Mutants.

You identify being a crazy kid yourself. I mean, close to them. I'm not a crazy kid at all. Do you have a particular song from them? Well, I love Caminante Noturno from Us Mutants. I think that's a beautiful song. A very crazy, interesting song. I actually am not even going to argue with you about that.

How often, how many times a day do you think about them? Oh, every day, many times. Maybe I think more about the Beatles because they're the myth. The mythology of everything in my head, maybe. But those mutantes are my favorite. Can you elaborate on that? I feel like the 20th century is a mythless century, and pop culture took that place

and the Beatles are kind of like the gospel or something like something relatable like the archetypal narrative which we can relate to something transcendental it's kind of like the Greek there are many God figures they're very imperfect and human like the pop culture

somehow provides that like Bowie is a force and the Beatles are a different force and Caitanovilles would be a different force. They are very archetypal, I think. Where do you fit yourself into all of that? Knowing that you wanted to be an artist. Was that like a thought in your head

about fitting into a mythology or a concern? No, I wasn't thinking about that. I think that came later. Because I dream a lot of all these artists at night. They're characters of my dream. So I started to realize that they mean something and their symbolic magnets to other meanings and all. But I wasn't thinking about that at all.

It was just like music and wanted to do stuff. When did that change? When did you start thinking about that? About the mythology and your place in it? I don't know. I think Tropicalia, this movement that happened, like the counterculture, very 360 movement that happened late 60s in Brazil, like that would include a vision of Brazil,

a vision of music in the world, and arts and all. There's a narrative also about the power of culture and music as a kind of mystic element in the day-to-day material life. I don't know. Do you feel like that's something that in Brazil there's like a more, is higher or more potent or magnified the mysticism of music and an artist?

I think it's potent everywhere. We just don't see it as supernatural, we forget that it is, that is magic or in the old sense of the world. But the more I think about these things, this comes later, you just do it because you feel it and it's intuitive. But the more I think about it, I feel like, well, actually, like rock and roll is a force. And this type of music, it's a force. It's hard to speak to say this stuff in English. Am I making some sense?

You are. Okay. It was also, I do want to quickly touch on the band that you chose. It's interesting to me because when I think about you, beyond just loving your music, I think about you fitting really beautifully into what is like, you know, the canon of what Brazil does is the most beautiful, poetic singer-songwriter. Like that is your lifeblood as a country to me, musically. Yeah, that's what I love, like, the type of songwriters and singers that happen in the 60s and 70s, such as Kai Tanu and God. A hundred percent.

And you, to me, you fit in there. Like, I've talked about that on this show. And for your band that inspired you to be actually quite fascinatingly different. But that's the crazy thing. They're not as different because they're part of the Tropicali movement. They were playing with Kaetano. And they play at Kaetano's album and he was writing some of these songs. So it was the moment of late 60s when they were all combining Kaitano.

wanted to break the purity of Brazilian music back then and to have a beat crazy band from Sao Paulo that would be willing to play Brazilian music with weird electronic instruments. Caitano Veloso, for those who don't know, is who, Tim? Well, Caitano Veloso is like a very, maybe the greatest singer-songwriter and thinker of Brazil that appear mainly in the 60s

and was the leader of this movement, Tropicalia, and then he got exiled by the dictatorship in the 70s and 80s and 90s. Since then, he's been making mind-blowing albums, and he's still doing it right now with 80-something years old. So he's like, he's the king. One of the greatest of all the time. Yes, he really is.

What song is the heart of Brazil for you? The heart of Brazil, a song? Casual. Wow. so many but I mean I feel like would be from one of these artists either

Caitano or Jill or George Ben or Gaul or even Milton Milton has a lot of like heart feeling it's a very emotional

Milton Lassimento so I mean maybe some song from Clubidae could be a good one like I don't know just the first one that comes to my mind

is Nouveen Cigana from Club de Esquina. That's a very beautiful piece of music. Like it's so there and it's so fearless. Like they're so unafraid to play with all these different orchestral components. I feel like this is even like a step later from Tropicalia was like really mixing, just like Sergeant Pepper did it in the 67 like mixing the orchestra and the pop. Like I think Tropicalia mixed all that with Brazilian music and then Cluby daiskinah

has even like a deeper mix and it mixed with jazz. too and like the classical part of it's very interesting. Tim, does everything just go back to the Beatles? No, maybe to the blues, yeah. All roads lead to the blues. And samba. And samba. If you had to pick a samba song, any samba song that's playing in your head right now.

Probably something from either Cartola or Nelson Kavaquino, for example, like, I love that. I need some samba right now. What a relaxed samba. Yeah, but it's very dramatic lyrics. Nelson Kavaquino, he's a badass. What's he saying in that chorus? He's saying like that when he passes close to the flowers,

they almost tell him like, go ahead. Tomorrow will be like over. your coffin. It's almost like this. It's like it's about like life being short and like he is very somber in many lyrics. It's like spooky spooky samba. A tranquil samba feels very risky business to me. It feels very confident.

Like it feels like you really are like no we're going to take our time and we're going to have a conversation but over a samba. And that doesn't all the time for me. That's not how I feel when I listen to samba. Yeah because it has I like when there's this combination that the music is kind of uplifting, but the lyrics have a different direction, and I like that combination. What Beatles song would be best in a samba arrangement? Well, it's hard to know, I mean, maybe none.

It's not right. You're like absolutely not. I love it. There was a song that were a person, and that person were a role model for you or someone you look up to. What song would that be? A role model song?

I like to keep it changing, and I like different stuff. I could say, like, today, on my mood right now, well, there's one song that is a big favorite for a long time, that is a Gilberto Gil song from his 68 album called Luza. I just adore that song. Late 60s in Brazil is very interesting, the combination of sounds. I'm sorry, encelling, ensuing, ensayando.

Oh, no. This want to be a tour, It's a car about me Matando Are you Are you About 8 hours of night

And I this taxi That transit Orriffel My God Illusia Illusia I'm

I'm I'm so cancad But I said that I Lucia Lulusa Is there Me

Esperant This is my entire, one entire, one mea, It's almost eight hours, the sala is chie. This is my song. This is my song. I claim this song. It's such a beautiful song. It's such a beautiful song.

And those Mutantius are the backing band on this recording soon. Everything about the way you describe, This scene in Brazil, I think it's everything that we would want music to continue to be, like this level of collaboration. Even the way you were describing what inspired Caitano Villoso to step outside of an experiment outside of just the canon of singer, songwriter, beautiful lyricism, just the desire to explore musically. Yeah, there was something like, it looks like there was something like underneath the earth

on the mid-60s of like something would have to come out as counterculture. And the manifestation of that in Brazil was very interesting, this tropicalia movement. What do you mean? Why did something need to come out? I mean, you know, like it was like the times they are changing, you know, like politically and in terms of music, aesthetic, the post-war children were like reaching adult lives. So all over the world, there was a manifestation of a newer wave or something, L'Velvaig, all this stuff. So in Brazil, that happened too in cinema and music and poetry and arts.

Has there been something like that since in Brazil? I don't know if with that potency, like, but and also because I think the part of tropicalia, like the role of tropicalia was like breaking the walls. So once the walls are broken, they're broken, you know, like the visions. So music was even more mixed after that. So I don't know, I think it's a very specific thing in time and space. There were as brilliant things that happened. But in this feeling of movement and happenings and stuff, this is something that happened all over the world in the 60s, I think.

Yeah. There's something about Brazil. I've been trying to understand everything, everything. Everything, lately more and more, I find a lot of music doesn't move me. And everything I find out of Brazil, I find to be the most exciting, the most engaging, the most experimental. It's why I'm finding so much of my inspiration musically. I mean, do you think that has something to do with it? Do you think that those walls are still down in Brazil in a way that they're not in other places?

I don't know. I mean, I feel like it happened sometimes in Brazil. like Bosanova was before that and also a big synthesis of different types of music like all the samba patterns and rhythms approached in a cool

jazz way and all that it happened then it happened Club de Iskina is also something but I do feel that something happened in the music industry in the 80s and 90s that also affected

Brazil that is like commerce and money took over a little bit it got less creative and Brazilian music suffered that too so I feel like now since the thousands and internet and people being able to record their own

way it's coming back and Brazil has in their blood like this tradition of very interesting music so what's happening again in Brazil now it has the nice thing of having this heritage somehow So I think it's... But I myself, I keep discovering old albums from Brazil.

Even now, like, there's always something that you're blown away. I think some places have this very richness of music. Like Cuba has that too. The States in many ways too. But Brazil is really special. The more I travel outside Brazil, the more I realize, like actually Brazil is not normal, musically. It's something different.

What's the most recent thing you discovered that really inspired you? Well, one thing that is very interesting, I haven't gotten into, when I was younger, I was more into the tropical and all. But Tom Jobin, Antonio Carlos Jobin, he did some interesting albums in the 70s. There are more symphonic, almost like classical music. One is Urubu, and the other one is Matita Pere. This albums have, is a very unique type of thing. music. It has the Brazilian thing, but it has, he's almost like a, really like a composer.

I like that too. This is, I think this is from the B-side. The B-Sides is fully orchestra. Wow. And this is the biggest, the guy that was the composer of Bossa Nova, the whole movement, and he went for this later on. I wonder why. He was very into like Villa Lobos that was the classical composer of the 30s, maybe, in Brazil. And if you pay attention, it is very Brazilian too,

type of melodies and chords and all. Why? What about the melody here? What about the chord? Like, what makes it feel Brazilian Brazilian bossa nova? Melody and harmony was influenced by stuff like Chopin and classical music because of Tonjo Béin. They were playing at samba, but they were influenced by that type of melody

and also mixed with jazz. So it's interesting. to see that Tom Jubin had this classical part of him too. This is the guy that wrote Girl from Ipanima. You know, and this and he also is this thing. The first

half of this album is very interesting because it's more mixed with Brazilian percussion. Yeah, this is the beginning of the album. This is interesting. Wow. Oh my god Tim. I have chills. I have full body chills. It's like the sneakiest orchestra of all time.

Like, oh, we're just... Yeah, and it's... It's really pretty. What do you take from all that, Tim? I mean, does that... Do you want to make music like that? Oh, I feel very influenced about this as an arranger. Because since, like, the last two albums of the Terno

and then my albums, I started to take the role of, like, doing the arranger of strings and brass and all. That's the type of arrangement I like, the Brazilian 70s orchestration. So that's what gets me excited on this music. Like, oh, I could use cellos like this, I could use this like that, you know.

But all of them speak and all of them feel essential. No sound feels, no sound feels excess, and yet it's so big. Well, I feel like in Brazil, there's a lot of contrast and dynamic. in life and in music. So when it's empty, it's very empty, and when the orchestra enters

is pretty bold. And things are more, in modern days and outside Brazil, but even in Brazil in modern days, things are more compressed. People play with metronome and all this stuff. And you lose a lot of dynamic,

I think. What song feels most like you? I could pick maybe one from Kaitano that we didn't play. We were mentioned. He has, yeah, and he has so many amazing songs. He has some interesting albums in the mid-70s. This album called Joya.

Any song from Joya, it's just a very interesting album. Yeah, it's the first song. Who's the first song. you are very much my man. Who's in this, think that you're very my filia, but in the

fact, you're very much my bichin' my bichin'bunito, my bichin'bunito all is very very great, so because God

my my woman, His voice, right? His voice, right? His voice, the guitar, too, the stylings on that guitar is like... He is the... He's something else, I mean, like, he's not only like the greatest songwriter, but he's also like the greatest, one of the greatest thinkers and not as in a whole sense.

It's almost like a biblical character. Like, it's very, very interesting. Kaitan is something else, like... universally stands out in the history of the world. In the history of the world, I think. Yeah. I would love to go out in a song of yours. Okay. So, of all the songs we played, if this were a playlist today,

what song would you fit into everything we just played? Oh, cool. Even maybe Real Meijlindu that I played earlier. Good pick. Yeah. All of love is Lindo It really

Lindo If the Vah Triteza For Favour Go go I'm

See Sorrow The new Newt Chegu The Sald Sald

I've Go I've I know Thank you so much. This is so fun. Will you please? Please, I'm actually super serious and I'm making you say it on the record.

Will you make me a playlist? Yes, of course. Amazing. Well, thank you for joining us on a Latino. Thank you so much. Thank you so much to Tim Bernardes for coming in. You can watch his tiny desk. It's available now on YouTube.

You have been listening to Alt Latino. Our audio producer is Noah Caldwell. The executive producer of NPR Music is Siriamahamed. Executive director is Sonali Meta. Also, if you wouldn't mind, as always, we love to hear from you. So please send us an email at Altlatino at npr.org. Seriously, I do read them and I love to hear from you all. So does Felix.

I'm Ana Maria Sayer. Thanks so much for listening. Statu is gigante.