Song of the Day 6/8: Astrud Gilberto, “The Girl from Ipanema”

Filed in Arts and Entertainment by on June 8, 2023

Guest post by Nathan Arizona

Turns out the Girl From Ipanema was also a Girl From Philadelphia. After Astrud Gilberto died there on Tuesday, many were surprised to hear that for the past several decades she had quietly made her home in Philly after moving there with her second husband around 1980 (they divorced a few years later). She was rumored to be living in a Society Hill apartment tower. She recorded her final album at a Philadelphia studio in 2001.

Astrud Gilberto was the girl who sang the Brazilian bossa nova classic “The Girl From Ipanema,” not the one in the song who passed by on her way to the beach and made the boys go, “ahhhh” (although she probably could have). “The Girl From Ipanema” was a smash hit in 1964 and became the second most recorded tune ever, after the Beatles’ “Yesterday.”

That would not have happened if Gilberto hadn’t been tapped at the last minute to add her vocals to those of her husband Joao Gilberto, who was recording the song in New York for an album with saxophonist Stan Getz and co-writer Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Her husband, probably the most important figure in early bossa nova, sang the first verse. But the producers thought a second verse sung by a woman would be nice. Astrud, the daughter of a German language professor, had merely accompanied her husband to the studio to watch him work, but was the only one there who knew English. Her whispery, deadpan, slightly amateurish style was also perfect for the mood of the song.

Here it is, with Getz. Plus another from the original album.

It was hoped that her low-key style would not overshadow the principals. Getz downplayed her contribution, calling her essentially a housewife who got lucky (it pains me to hear Stan Getz was a jerk). But she had in fact done some singing in Brazil. It was her vocal on “The Girl From Ipanema” that caught the public’s attention, not her husband’s. His vocal was cut when the record was edited for a single.

A few months later that popular album cut was re-recorded with only her singing. That’s the version that poured out of radios all over the world. She didn’t get the royalties due her then, but she went on to record many albums of bossa nova, jazz and standards.

Here she is later on a U.S. standard.

Astrud Gilberto was never really comfortable in the public eye. Retirement in Philadelphia probably suited her.

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