An e-mail announcement from the trumpeter Brad Goode:
I realize that few Rifftides readers will find themselves in the tiny Boulder, Colorado, suburb of Niwot tomorrow. If you are in that area of the Rocky Mountains, however, and make it to Trepedda’s Italian Ristorante, hearing Brad Goode will be worth the trip even if you have to drive all the way from Boulder or Denver.
But that’s not the point. The point is that Goode’s bass player is named Bijoux Barbosa. I’m always intrigued by euphonious appellations, as Cuthbert J. Twillie called fine-sounding names. But, I wondered, who is Bijoux Barbosaand can he play? A web search answered the first question. He’s Brazilian. His real first name is Eduardo. He studied in his hometown of São Paulo, has been in Colorado for 15 years and has worked with Herbie Mann, Brian Lynch, Ron Blake, Jaleel Shaw and Ron Miles, among others.
Whether he can play, you may judge from this brief duet with tenor saxophonist Eric Trujillo at the Mi Vida Strings shop in Denver. The piece is Chucho Valdez’s “Mambo Influenciado.”
Given the list of performance credits above, it is clear that Bijoux Barbosa is far from unknown, but he was new to me. Perhaps he is to you. I’ll be keeping an ear out for him.