897 Free Choro Charts on Doce de Choro website!

Choro is a Brazilian music genre, mostly instrumental, improvisational, with a history beginning in the 19th century, predating American jazz. If you are a jazz player and not familiar with choro, you really should check it out. The repertoire is extensive and rich (a few famous composers: Pixinguinha, Jacob do Bandolim, Waldir Azevedo, K-Ximbinho). Performance styles have evolved over the years (as has American jazz), and there are some truly great performers active today.

If you are into choro, the website Doce de Choro (click here) is a gold mine - lead sheets for 897 choros are available for free download. The charts were created by Jean Pascal Leriche-Lafaurie (at least I assume so, as that is the only name listed on the website). Some of the tunes are classics, some are obscure; some are simple, some melodically and harmonically challenging.

I do play some choros with my group, with a jazz approach. I count myself as a fan and student, not an expert. You can find plenty of information about choro on the web, and plenty of performances, old and new, on Youtube.

Just for laughs, here are two recordings of a classic, "Assanhado" by Jacob do Bandolim (1918-1969). It's one of the first choros I learned.

First, here is the original recording by Jacob (click here).

Compare Jacob's original to this more modern version by two great players, Armandinho and Yamandu Costa: