Jazz Wise (UK) ****

BBC Radio recently called Brazilian-born singer/songwriter Vinicius Cantuaria the “master of the sublimely sensual” and his latest disc, his fifth studio album since he migrated to New York City from Rio de Janeiro in 1995, bears this out. Deceptively simple, almost startlingly intimate, Silva underlines the fact that long before such neo-Brazilian artists as Bebel Gilberto, Moreno Veloso and Celso Fonesca, there was Cantuaria – blazing a bossa nova/jazz/electronica trail for others to follow. Silva is unashamedly less jazzy than its predecessor, the 2004 studio album Horse and Fish, offering a smooth Brazilian feel enhanced by compelling, rhythmic guitar playing and sexy, sotto voce vocals, New York trumpeter Michael Leonhart delivers suitably understated solos on four tracks; Japanese electronic composer Jun Miyake drops some deft keyboards here, some ethereal flugelhorns there, to help create the sort of left field ambience particular to early Cantuaria champions including Laurie Anderson, Brian Eno, Arto Lindsay. Indeed, it’s thanks to Lindsay’s translation that three tracks on Silva are sung in English. All in all, rather wonderful.