Philly Bloco – Brazilian Music in Philadelphia

Philly Bloco is a Brazilian-style band in the Rio “bloco” setup, which combines a small samba percussion ensemble with horns, bass, guitar, and other instruments — sometimes an accordion. The band covers Brazilian music styles including Samba, Forro, and MPB (Música Popular Brasileira).In addition to Brazilian music, Philly Bloco adapts a variety of music styles and samba-izes their rhythms, including Reggae, R&B, and pop.  About twenty-five members perform in the band — many of them as multi-instrumentalists. The band also has a full-time dancer, who, incidentally, is the only Brazilian. To find out more check out: www.phillybloco.com.

The live footage in this video was shot at Philly Bloco’s record release party at the Blockley in West Philadelphia March 18, 2011. Several of the members of the band agreed to let me interview them at a later date. This was my first real video project. In fact, it was my final project for video production course at the University of the Arts.