Bebel Gilberto Embraces and Expands upon her Bossa Nova Bloodlines on New Disc

It’s fitting that All In One, Bebel Gilberto‘s new studio album, has been released by Verve Records. It’s the label that released Getz/Gilberto in 1964, still one of the best-selling jazz albums of all time and the one that launched Brazil’s sexy bossa nova sound to international acclaim with the genre’s signature song, “The Girl from Ipanema.” Of course, the Gilberto in that album’s title is bossa nova pioneer, guitarist/singer João Gilberto, Bebel’s father.

It’s no picnic trying to forge your own musical career in the long, dark shadow of a legendary musician dad — just ask Jakob Dylan or Julian and Sean Lennon — but Bebel Gilberto is making as good a go of it as any of her second-generation peers. And she’s done it by both embracing and expanding upon the music that’s in her blood, encapsulated perfectly in her new disc’s updated version of her father’s “Bim Bom,” one of the very first bossa nova compositions. If any more authenticity were needed, the song also features the playing and singing of Daniel Jobim, grandson of another of bossa nova’s founding fathers, Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Born in New York City, Bebel Gilberto embraces American and Brazilian music and stirs them together on the appropriately titled All In One. There’s a gorgeous reading of Stevie Wonder‘s “The Real Thing” and a campy, modern take on “Chica Chica Boom Chic,” the Carmen Miranda classic.

Meanwhile, her original songs are a marvelous blend of melodic American pop and Brazilian rhythmic swing — a sound that is truly her own. All the tunes are linked by Gilberto’s sultry and charming vocals, still slightly stilted in English but breezy and beautiful in her native Portuguese.

All In One is available now.