album rating: ★★★★☆
Genre: MPB / Brazilian jazz / vocal / bossa nova / canção. Puro Prazer ('Pure Pleasure') is the sixteenth studio album by Zizi Possi (born Maria Lúcia Godoy Possi, São Paulo, 1952), one of Brazil's most distinguished and technically accomplished vocal artists. After a period of extraordinary commercial success with two Italian-language albums — Per Amore (1997, triple platinum, 750,000 copies) and Passione (1998, platinum, 250,000 copies) — Possi returned to the Portuguese-speaking repertoire with a project that was both deliberate and intimate: voice and piano alone, with no other instrumentation. The choice was consistent with a long personal commitment to stripping away the overproduction that had characterised much of her earlier major-label work, a tendency she had resisted by leaving Philips in the early 1990s. The album's repertoire is a lyric-lover's collection of Brazilian, Latin American and Italian songs, including 'Disparada' (Théo de Barros and Geraldo Vandré), 'Volver a los Diecisiete' (Violeta Parra), 'Luiza' (Tom Jobim), 'Pedaço de Mim' (Chico Buarque), 'Sobre Todas as Coisas' (Edu Lobo and Chico Buarque), 'Rebento' (Gilberto Gil), 'Tanta Saudade' (Chico Buarque and Djavan), 'Beatriz' (Edu Lobo and Chico Buarque), 'Torna a Surriento' and 'Che cosa c'è' (Gino Paoli).
Label: Universal Music / PolyGram (Brazil), 1999. Produced by Zizi Possi and Moogie Canázio. Directed by Guto Graça Mello.
Producer: Zizi Possi and Moogie Canázio.
Recording studios: Sony Music Studios, Santa Monica, California, USA (main sessions); additional sessions at Blue Studio, Rio de Janeiro; Studio Splash, Naples, Italy; and Air Lyndhurst Studios, London, England. Mastered by Bernie Grundman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, Los Angeles.
Critical reception: The album was received with critical acclaim. Aluízio Falcão of IstoÉ Gente named it one of the best albums of 1999, praising Possi's 'velvet and crystal emission' voice and particularly highlighting 'Beatriz', 'Vurria' and 'Tanta Saudade'. The Folha de S.Paulo described the project as 'zeroing out a career' — meaning a fresh start — after two decades of accumulated production choices. Slipcue praised the 'gravity and warmth' of the presentation, calling it a 'lyric-lover's delight.' The album was nominated for the Latin Grammy in the categories of Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and Best Contemporary Brazilian Pop Album.
Commercial success: Puro Prazer sold over 100,000 copies in Brazil within four months of release and was certified gold by Pro-Música Brasil (PMB). The album was also released in Portugal, where it received positive coverage, including a favourable review in Público (May 2002).
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