Berman Brothers (producers)

Last updated
Berman Brothers
Berman Brothers.jpg
Background information
OriginGermany
Genres Pop, rock
Occupation(s) Producers, songwriters
Years active1993–present
MembersFrank Bermann
Christian Bermann
Website bermanbrothers.com

The Berman Brothers are the record production duo of siblings Frank and Christian Berman.

Contents

Early life

The Bermans grew up in Riesenbeck, Germany. [1]

Careers

In 2006, the Bermans created and co-produced the album Rhythms del Mundo , with Cuban musicians including Ibrahim Ferrer and Omara Portuondo of the Buena Vista Social Club, and US and UK artists such as U2, Coldplay, Sting, Jack Johnson, Maroon 5, Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs, and others. Rhythms del Mundo was released in over 61 countries and received sales awards. The project is in aid of Artists Project Earth (APE), which lends support for natural disaster relief and climate change awareness.

The Berman Brothers have created remixes for Real McCoy [1] and have produced records for Hanson, Baha Men, and Sophie B Hawkins.

In 2014, the Bermans released Studio Rio Presents: The Brazil Connection ; it sets the music of jazz classics to samba and bossa nova arrangements. Artists include Billie Holiday, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, and Sly & The Family Stone. [2] The Studio Rio version of "It's Your Thing" by The Isley Brothers was featured on the 2014 Fifa World Cup Album One Love, One Rhythm. The song was also used during the ESPN soccer World Cup coverage.

Their music has been used in television and film advertisements for Nissan, Casio, Lufthansa, Honda, and Lexus. Their songs have been used in the films Miss Congeniality and Parent Trap as well as in the television series House and The Sopranos .

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samba</span> Brazilian musical genre

Samba is a name or prefix used for several rhythmic variants, such as samba urbano carioca, samba de roda, recognized as part of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO, amongst many other forms of samba, mostly originated in the Rio de Janeiro and Bahia states.

Bossa nova is a relaxed style of samba developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is mainly characterized by a calm syncopated rhythm with chords and fingerstyle mimicking the beat of a samba groove, as if it was a simplification and stylization on the guitar of the rhythm produced by a samba school band. Another defining characteristic of the style is the use of unconventional chords in some cases with complex progressions and "ambiguous" harmonies. A common misconception is that these complex chords and harmonies were derived from jazz, but samba guitar players have been using similar arrangement structures since the early 1920s, indicating a case of parallel evolution of styles rather than a simple transference from jazz to bossa nova. Nevertheless bossa nova was influenced by jazz, both in the harmonies used and also by the instrumentation of songs, today many bossa nova songs are considered jazz standards. The increase in popularity of bossa nova has helped to renew samba and contributed to the modernization of Brazilian music in general.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Zé</span> Brazilian singer-songwriter

Antônio José Santana Martins, known professionally as Tom Zé, is a Brazilian singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer who was influential in the Tropicália movement of 1960s Brazil. After the peak of the Tropicália period, Zé went into relative obscurity: it was only in the 1990s, when musician and Luaka Bop label head David Byrne discovered Zé's 1975 album Estudando o Samba and then released reissues of his work, that Zé returned to performing and releasing new material.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Baden Powell (guitarist)</span> Brazilian guitarist

Baden Powell de Aquino, known professionally as Baden Powell, was a Brazilian guitarist. He combined classical techniques with popular harmony and swing. He performed in many styles, including bossa nova, samba, Brazilian jazz, Latin jazz and MPB. He performed on stage during most of his lifetime. Powell composed many pieces for guitar some of them now considered guitar standards, such as Abração em Madrid, Braziliense, Canto de Ossanha, Casa Velha, Consolação, Horizon, Imagem, Lotus, Samba, Samba Triste, Simplesmente, Tristeza e Solidão, and Samba da Benção. He released Os Afro-sambas, a watershed album in MPB, with Vinicius de Moraes in 1966. He's widely regarded as one of the greatest brazilian guitar players of all time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cássia Eller</span> Brazilian singer (1962–2001)

Cássia Rejane Eller was a Brazilian singer, composer, and multi-instrumentalist, regarded as one of the greatest representatives of Brazilian rock in the 1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jorge Ben</span> Brazilian musician

Jorge Duílio Lima Menezes is a Brazilian popular musician, performing under the stage name Jorge Ben Jor since the 1980s, though commonly known by his former stage name Jorge Ben. Performing in a samba style that also explored soul, funk, rock and bossa nova sounds, Ben has recorded such well-known songs as "Chove Chuva", "Mas, que Nada!", "Ive Brussel" and "Balança Pema". His music has been interpreted by artists such as Caetano Veloso, Sérgio Mendes, Miriam Makeba, Soulfly and Marisa Monte.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Olodum</span> Brazilian drumming ensemble

Olodum is a bloco-afro from Salvador's carnival, in Bahia, Brazil. It was founded by the percussionist Neguinho do Samba.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martinho da Vila</span> Brazilian singer and composer (born 1938)

Martinho da Vila is a Brazilian singer and composer who is considered to be one of the main representatives of samba and MPB. He is a prolific songwriter, with hundreds of recorded songs across over 40 solo albums. He also has many songs that were recorded by singers from different musical genres.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Luiz Bonfá</span> Brazilian guitarist and composer (1922–2001)

Luiz Floriano Bonfá was a Brazilian guitarist and composer. He was best known for the music he composed for the film Black Orpheus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brazilian Carnival</span> Annual festival in Brazil

The Carnival of Brazil is an annual festival held the Friday afternoon before Ash Wednesday at noon, which marks the beginning of Lent, the forty-day period before Easter. During Lent, Roman Catholics and some other Christians traditionally abstained from the consumption of meat and poultry, hence the term "carnival", from carnelevare, "to remove meat."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">It's Your Thing</span> 1969 single by The Isley Brothers

"It's Your Thing" is a funk single by The Isley Brothers. Released in 1969, the anthem was an artistic response to Motown chief Berry Gordy's demanding hold on his artists after the Isleys left the label in late 1968.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elza Soares</span> Brazilian samba singer (1930–2022)

Elza da Conceição Soares, known professionally as Elza Soares, was a Brazilian samba singer. In 1999, she was named Singer of the Millennium along with Tina Turner by BBC Radio.

Kenny Young was an American songwriter, musician, producer and environmental campaigner who wrote and in some cases produced hit songs for The Drifters, Ronnie Dove, Herman's Hermits, Mark Lindsay, Reparata and the Delrons, Clodagh Rodgers, Quincy Jones, and Fox, among others. His most successful and famous songs as a writer include the Grammy Hall of Fame song "Under the Boardwalk", and the Grammy Award winning song, "Ai No Corrida". From the late 1960s, he lived in the UK.

Funk carioca, also known as favela funk, in other parts of the world as baile funk and Brazilian funk, or even simply funk, is a hip hop-influenced music genre from Rio de Janeiro, blending the rap subgenres of Miami bass and gangsta rap. Despite its name, funk carioca has no musical correlation with the American funk by any means.

<i>Rhythms del Mundo</i> 2006 compilation album by Various Artists

Rhythms del Mundo is a nonprofit collaborative album, which fuses an all-star cast of Cuban musicians including Ibrahim Ferrer and Omara Portuondo of the Buena Vista Social Club with tracks from US, UK and Irish artists such as Dido, Arctic Monkeys, U2, Coldplay, Sting, Jack Johnson, Maroon 5, Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs and others. A follow-up album, Rhythms del Mundo Classics, was released in 2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marcos Valle</span> Musical artist

Marcos Kostenbader Valle is a Brazilian singer, songwriter, and record producer. He has produced works in many musical styles, including bossa nova, samba, and fusions of rock, soul, jazz, and dance music with Brazilian styles. Valle is credited for popularizing bossa nova in the 1960s.

Victor Rice is an American bassist, composer and producer from Long Island, NY. Rice moved to New York City in 1985 to attend Manhattan School of Music, where he received his BM and MM degrees in orchestral performance under Homer Mensch and Linda McKnight, respectively. Rice started his career producing records for the record label Moon Ska Records the following year. In 1996, he moved to Stubborn Records and began engineering his own productions. He moved to São Paulo, Brazil in 2002 and built his own studio, Studio Copan where he is the sole engineer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alexandre Pires</span> Brazilian singer-songwriter (born 1976)

Alexandre Pires do Nascimento is a Brazilian singer-songwriter. Pires was previously the singer of group Só Pra Contrariar which he joined in the late 1980s.

<i>Canibália</i> 2009 studio album by Daniela Mercury

Canibália is Daniela Mercury's ninth studio album, released on October 23, 2009, in Brazil by Sony Music. It was released on October 24 in the United States and on October 27 in the European Union. Mercury's first studio release in four years brings not only an eclectic sound, but also five different covers.

<i>Studio Rio</i> 2014 studio album by Studio Rio

Studio Rio Presents: The Brazil Connection is an album of well-known songs arranged for samba and bossa nova. The recording was published in digital formats, on vinyl record, and as a compact disc in 2014 by Legacy Recordings. Song versions were arranged and performed by Studio Rio, a band of Brazilian musicians specializing in the bossa nova and samba genres. Notable members include Roberto Menescal and Marcos Valle.

References

  1. 1 2 "Berman Brothers Turn Their Production Talent Towards Columbia's Up-And-Comers". Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. 17 January 1998. p. 74. ISSN   0006-2510 . Retrieved 28 Nov 2023.
  2. Myers, Marc (20 June 2014). "Soul Classics Get a Samba Flavor". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 28 November 2023. Frank Berman, 48, who produced "The Brazil Connection" (Sony) with his brother Christian, 45