{{About|the Brazilian singer and musician|the Brazilian actress|Tânia Maria}} {{BLP refimprove|date=September 2025}} {{Short description|Brazilian musician (born 1948)}} {{Infobox musical artist | name = Tania Maria | image = Tania_Maria.jpg | caption = Tania Maria in 2013 | background = solo_singer | birth_name = Tania Maria Correa Reis<ref>Fairweather, Digby. ''The Rough Guide to Jazz'', Rough Guides, p. 6 (2004) - {{ISBN|1-84353-256-5}}</ref> | alias = | birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1948|5|9}} | death_date = | origin = São Luís, Maranhão, Brazil | instrument = Piano | genre = Jazz, pop, MPB | occupation = Musician, composer, bandleader | years_active = 1969–present | label = Concord, Capitol, Blue Note, EMI, Universal | website = [http://www.taniamaria.net/ TaniaMaria.net] }}
'''Tania Maria''' (born May 9, 1948)<ref name="LarkinGE">{{cite book|title=The Guinness Encyclopedia of Popular Music|editor=Colin Larkin|publisher=Guinness Publishing|date=1992|edition=First|isbn=0-85112-939-0|page=2443}}</ref> is a Brazilian artist, singer, composer, bandleader and piano player, singing mostly in Portuguese or English. Her Brazilian-style music is mostly vocal, sometimes pop, often jazzy, and includes samba, bossa, Afro-Latin, pop and jazz fusion.
==Biography== [[File:Tania Maria Monterey Jazz Festival 1981.jpg|thumb|At Monterey Jazz Festival 1981]] ===Early years=== Born in São Luís, Maranhão, Brazil,<ref name="LarkinGE"/> Tania Maria began playing the piano at the age of seven, became a leader at the age of 13, when her band of professional musicians, organized by her father, won first prize in a local music contest and went on to play for dances, in clubs and on the radio. Her father, a metal worker and a gifted guitarist and singer, had encouraged her to study piano so that she could play in his weekend jam sessions, where she first absorbed the rhythms and melodies of samba, jazz, pop music and Brazilian chorinho. Since then, she has never worked in anyone else's group. However, her mother was strongly against her daughter's pursuing a musical career, and at the age of 17, as reported by ''The New York Times'', Maria "capitulated to conflicting parental pressures by getting married, giving up the piano entirely and studying law for two and a half years. But the desire to play kept nagging at her, and after five years of marriage, she left her husband and family to try to make a living as a musician."<ref name="New York Times">{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1983/08/19/arts/brazilian-pianist-on-expatriate-road-to-stardom.html|title=Brazilian pianist on expatriate road to stardom|first=Stephen|last=Holden|newspaper=The New York Times|date=19 August 1983|access-date=2 December 2025}}</ref>
===Recording career=== Maria's first album, ''Apresentamos'' (''We Present''), was released in Brazil in 1966, followed by ''Olha Quem Chega'' (''Look Who's Here!'') in 1971, but it was a move in 1974 to Paris, France, where she took a residency at the Via Brazil restaurant,<ref name="BBC Review">{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/reviews/x363/|title=Tania Maria Come With Me Review|first=Daryl|last=Easlea|date=2009|publisher=BBC Music|access-date=2 December 2025}}</ref> that exploded her onto the international scene.<ref name="LarkinGE"/> At a concert in Australia, her formidable musical precision and freewheeling spirit caught the attention of the American guitarist, Charlie Byrd, who recommended her to Carl Jefferson, founder of Concord Records.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://concord.com/artist/tania-maria/|title=Tania Maria|website=Concord.com|access-date=14 October 2021}}</ref> She relocated to New York at the start of the 1980s, signing with the label.<ref name="BBC Review" />
Tania's 1983 album ''Come With Me'' – her third album with Concord – started her international breakthrough, with the title song becoming a 1980s dance-floor classic that has since been covered frequently. A year later, in 1984, her ''Love Explosion'' album contained the track "Deep Cove View" which was promoted by Robbie Vincent on his Sunday night soul shows on BBC Radio 1. The 1985 album ''Made in New York'' increased her popularity further worldwide.<ref name="LarkinGE"/>
Maria has played virtually every important jazz festival in the world and has appeared on countless television and radio programmes. She has recorded more than 25 albums<ref name=NovaConcerts>[http://www.novaconcerts.com/taniamaria.html Tania Maria], ''Nova Concerts International'', April 12, 2012.</ref> and in 1985 was nominated for a Grammy Award in the category "Best Jazz Vocal Performance, Female".<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/awards|title=Awards|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|access-date=14 October 2021}}</ref> She has performed at venues such as the Blue Note and festivals including the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1981, 1983 and 1989, Saratoga Jazz Festival, JVC Jazz Fest 1991, Montreux Jazz Festival, New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, Newport Jazz Festival in 1975,<ref name="LarkinGE"/> Puerto Rico Heineken Jazzfest 2001, Malta Jazz Festival 2003 at Maltese Islands, Novosadski Jazz Festival 2004, Belgium's Jazz Middelheim 2007. She performed at the annual North Sea Jazz Festival in The Hague in 1978 and has returned there at least 10 times. She has played with such artists as Steve Gadd, Anthony Jackson, Sammy Figueroa and Eddie Gómez.
==Discography== ===Albums=== {| class="wikitable sortable" |- !Year !Title !Genre !Label |- |1966 |''Apresentamos'' |Brazilian jazz |Continental |- |1971 |''Olha Quem Chega'' |Brazilian jazz |Odeon |- |1975 |''Via Brasil'' |Brazilian jazz |Sunny Side |- |1975 |''Via Brasil, Vol. 2'' |Brazilian jazz |Sunny Side |- |1978 |''Brazil with My Soul'' |Brazilian jazz |Barclay |- |rowspan="2"|1979 |''Live'' |Brazilian jazz |Accord |- |{{Sort|Maria, Tania in Copenhagen|''Tania Maria in Copenhagen'' (with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen)}} |Brazilian jazz |Accord |- |1980 |''Piquant'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |1981 |''Taurus'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |1983 |''Come with Me'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |1984 |''Love Explosion'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |1984 |{{Sort|Real Tania Maria, The: Wild|''The Real Tania Maria: Wild!''}} |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |1985 |''Made in New York'' |Brazilian jazz |EMI |- |1986 |''Lady from Brazil'' |Brazilian jazz |EMI |- |1988 |''Forbidden Colors'' |Brazilian jazz |Capitol |- |1990 |''Bela Vista'' |Brazilian jazz |Blue Note |- |rowspan="2"|1993 |''Outrageous'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |{{Sort|Best of Tania Maria, The|''The Best of Tania Maria''}} |Brazilian jazz |Blue Note |- |rowspan="2"|1995 |''No Comment'' |Brazilian jazz |TKM |- |''Bluesilian'' |Brazilian jazz |TKM |- |1997 |''Europe'' |Brazilian jazz |TKM |- |2000 |''Viva Brazil'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord Records |- |rowspan="2"|2002 |''Happiness'' |Brazilian jazz |Recall Records UK |- |{{Sort|Maria, Tania Live at the Blue Note|''Tania Maria Live at the Blue Note''}} |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |2003 |''Outrageously Wild'' |Brazilian jazz |Concord |- |2004 |''Olha Quem Chega'' (reissue) |Brazilian jazz |Import |- |rowspan="3"|2005 |''Intimidade'' |Brazilian jazz |Blue Note |- |{{Sort|Maria, Tania in Copenhagen|''Tania Maria in Copenhagen'' (with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen)}} (reissue) |Brazilian jazz |Stunt |- |''Brazil with My Soul'' (reissue) |Brazilian jazz |Universal |-
|2011 |''Tempo'' (with Eddie Gómez) |Brazilian jazz |Naïve Records |- |2012 |''Canto'' |Brazilian jazz |Naïve Records |}
=== Filmography === * 2008: ''Tanya Maria: The Beat of Brazil'' with Laurindo Almeida
==See also== * "Chiclete com banana"
== References == {{Reflist|30em}}
== External links == * {{Official website|http://www.taniamaria.net|Tania Maria}} – broken link - [https://web.archive.org/web/20050405203551/http://www.taniamaria.net/ archived taniamaria.net 2005] [https://web.archive.org/web/20170907030232/http://www.taniamaria.org/ archived taniamaria.org 2017] * [https://www.allaboutjazz.com/musicians/tania-maria Tania Maria] at All About Jazz * {{Discogs artist}} * {{YouTube|vzN7k8SzexA|Tania Maria}} – at the North Sea Jazz festival
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Maria, Tania}} Category:1948 births Category:Living people Category:Brazilian jazz bandleaders Category:Brazilian jazz pianists Category:Brazilian jazz singers Category:Brazilian women jazz singers Category:Jazz-pop pianists Category:Jazz-pop singers Category:Latin jazz pianists Category:Latin jazz singers Category:People from São Luís, Maranhão Category:Post-bop pianists Category:Post-bop singers Category:Brazilian bossa nova singers Category:Brazilian bossa nova pianists Category:Música popular brasileira pianists Category:Música popular brasileira singers Category:Brazilian women jazz pianists Category:Brazilian jazz composers Category:20th-century Brazilian women singers Category:20th-century Brazilian singers Category:21st-century Brazilian women singers Category:21st-century Brazilian singers Category:21st-century Brazilian pianists Category:Women in Latin music Category:20th-century Brazilian women pianists Category:21st-century Brazilian women pianists Category:English-language Brazilian singers Category:Portuguese-language Brazilian singers