Bio:
Nascido e criado em Bangu, foi no Irajá que começou a atuar profissionalmente na música, aos 15 anos de idade, no Pagode da Tia Ciça, roda frequentada por grandes figuras do samba.
Fruto das rodas de samba, Alvaro foi abençoado pelas sombras da Tamarineira mais famosa do Brasil, tocou durante 5 anos no templo mágico chamado Cacique de Ramos, Roda que era comandada por Bira Presidente e Renatinho Partideiro. Passou ainda por diversas rodas de samba conhecidas do público carioca, tais como: "Clube do Cozido" que era mais conhecido como Cozido do Zeca, local onde Zeca Pagodinho recebia seus amigos para beber e bater um bom papo.
Canto do Batuqueiro, Beco do Rato, Samba Luzia, Terreiro de Crioulo, Mafuá no Quintal entre outros...
Mas foi no Samba do Trabalhador que surgiu o cantor, até então Álvaro Santos, quando interpretou pela primeira vez a música "Estranhou O Quê?" no 2º DVD/CD " Moacyr Luz e Samba do Trabalhador ao Vivo no Renascença" . A partir deste disco, desperta um interesse em Moacyr Luz de fazer um CD solo de Nego Alvaro, apelido carinhoso que o próprio Moa colocou.
Moacyr chamou Pretinho da Serrinha para produzir o disco, que logo de cara aceitou e fez genuinamente o CD Cria do Samba, que conta com as participações de Sereno, Mart'nalia e Moacyr Luz. Com arranjos de Rildo Hora, Carlinhos 7 Cordas, Pretinho da Serrinha, Rafael dos Anjos e Thiago da Serrinha. (previsão de lançamento do CD Cria do Samba em Setembro de 2016).
Álvaro era músico de Beth Carvalho e nos shows dividia a música "Ainda é Tempo Pra Ser Feliz" com a sua madrinha .
Parceiro de música de Moacyr Luz, Marcelinho Moreira, Pretinho da Serrinha, Sereno do Fundo de Quintal, Leandro Fab, João Martins, Gabrielzinho de Iraja e por aí vai...
Como músico já acompanhou, Zeca Pagodinho, Fundo de Quintal, Zélia Duncan, Dona Ivone Lara, Arlindo Cruz, Caetano Veloso, Mariene de Castro, Baby do Brasil, Jorge Ben, Dudu Nobre, Leci Brandão, Mart'nalia, Sombrinha, Velha Guarda da Mangueira , Xande de Pilares, Jorge Aragão, Maria Rita, Adriana Calcanhoto, Nei Matogrosso, Teresa Cristina entre outros...
The Recôncavo is an almost invisible center-of-gravity. Circumscribing the Bay of All Saints, this region was landing for more enslaved human beings than any other such throughout all of human history. Not unrelated, it is also birthplace of some of the most physically & spiritually uplifting music ever made. —Sparrow
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers: Personal recording engineer for Prince, inc. "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"... Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory
I'm Pardal here in Brazil (that's "Sparrow" in English). The deep roots of this project are in Manhattan, where Allen Klein (managed the Beatles and The Rolling Stones) called me about royalties for the estate of Sam Cooke... where Jerry Ragovoy (co-wrote Time is On My Side, sung by the Stones; Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin of course; and Pata Pata, sung by the great Miriam Makeba) called me looking for unpaid royalties... where I did contract and licensing for Carlinhos Brown's participation on Bahia Black with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock...
...where I rescued unpaid royalties for Aretha Franklin (from Atlantic Records), Barbra Streisand (from CBS Records), Led Zeppelin, Mongo Santamaria, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Jim Hall, Wah Wah Watson (Melvin Ragin), Ray Barretto, Philip Glass, Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd for his interest in Bob Marley compositions, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam and others...
...where I worked with Earl "Speedo" Carroll of the Cadillacs (who went from doo-wopping as a kid on Harlem streetcorners to top of the charts to working as a janitor at P.S. 87 in Manhattan without ever losing what it was that made him special in the first place), and with Jake and Zeke Carey of The Flamingos (I Only Have Eyes for You)... stuff like that.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay. They paid.
MATRIX MUSICAL
The Matrix was built below among some of the world's most powerfully moving music, some of it made by people barely known beyond village borders. Or in the case of Sodré, his anthem A MASSA — a paean to Brazil's poor ("our pain is the pain of a timid boy, a calf stepped on...") — having blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south, before he was silenced. (that's me left, with David Dye & Kim Junod for U.S. National Public Radio) ... The Matrix started with Sodré, with João do Boi, with Roberto Mendes, with Bule Bule, with Roque Ferreira... music rooted in the sugarcane plantations of Bahia. Hence our logo (a cane cutter).