Dani Gurgel

Origin

São Paulo, SP

Years Active

2000s

Genres

brazilian jazz, MPB, jazz, pop, rock, electronica

Instruments

voice, saxophone, bass, piano, flute, guitar

Biography

Dani Gurgel is a Brazilian singer, composer, and multi-instrumentalist born in São Paulo in 1985. She emerged from a musical family, with a pianist mother, Debora Gurgel, and a jazz saxophonist father. Gurgel's musical journey began at the age of three, and she honed her skills under her mother's tutelage. Initially, she explored instruments like the bass in rock bands and the saxophone in big bands, accumulating 15 years of experience before discovering her primary instrument: her voice.

Her vocal style is characterized by precise scat singing, which blends the percussive and syncopated rhythms of Brazil with the fluid curves of jazz. Critics have described her scatting as "a fantastic syllabary" and "scatted vocal adventures." Gurgel's music transcends genre boundaries, incorporating elements of jazz, rock, pop, and electronica, and she performs in English, Portuguese, and through lyricless compositions. Her work often reflects her global experiences, having performed extensively in Japan, the USA, China, Germany, Uruguay, and Brazil.

Beyond her solo career, Dani Gurgel has achieved significant recognition with the "Dani & Debora Gurgel Quarteto" (DDG4), a group she formed with her mother. This ensemble has released eight albums and garnered multiple awards, including the Brazilian Music Professionals award and Japan's Best Brazilian Album. In recent years, the quartet expanded into the DDG19 Big Band, a larger ensemble that has released new material and toured internationally. Gurgel also holds a Ph.D. in communication from the University of São Paulo, with a dissertation focusing on música popular brasileira (MPB).

Discography

• Nosso (2008)
• Agora (2010)
• Viadutos (2011)
• Um (2013)
• Luz (2014)
• Garra (2015)
• Neon (2015)
• DDG4 (2016)
• Tuqti (2017)
• Outro Som (2018)
• Rodopio (2019)
• DDG19 Big Band (2024)