KEXP Documentaries: The New World - Curumin

Ron Henry

Each week at KEXP we produce a radio documentary on a musical subject. Our documentaries are short stories, around 4-8 minutes long, and are packed with music. Our current series is The New World, where we find the most cutting-edge artists on the international music scene.

Curumin is a vocalist, songwriter from Brazil. He was trained to be a samba player as a child, but living in the metropolis of Sao Paulo, he was exposed to many different styles…soul, funk, punk, electronic and all kinds of world music. His parents were from Japan and Spain, and, being a child of the computer generation, he dove into sounds from those cultures. He’s collected thousands of tracks, he calls “research” on his IPod. Curumin believes that all music influences him, so the result is a collection of his own songs that launch a warm guitar groove into the future.

Curumin (pronounced: “Coo-roo-min”) is influenced by the great Jorge Ben, a songwriter and bandleader who took Brazilian music onto the international pop scene in the 1970s. Incorporating rock and African sounds into his work, Jorge was discovered and supported by David Byrne, and his success became an inspiration to the melting pot that is Brazilian popular music. Curumin shared Jorge Ben’s dream of taking the people’s music, the mixed music, of Brazil to an international audience.

KEXP Documentaries are produced by Michele Myers, with assistance from John Felthous and Leah Pogwizd. You can hear all our KEXP Docs series including: Punk Evolution, Masters of Turntablism, The Heart of Soul, Pop Goes Electronic and more in the On Demand section of kexp.org.