In any language, she’s a marvel!
LIVE: Anitta (Royal Festival Hall, London) Verdict: Stardom beckons ★★★★✩
THE Meltdown Festival, curated this year by Nile Rodgers, is one of the feelgood live hits of the summer, having featured must-see gigs by the guitarist’s own outfit Chic, former Smith Johnny Marr and Brazil’s biggest pop star, Anitta.
The singer, born Larissa De Macedo Machado, is already a sensation in Latin America, with 40 million Instagram followers, and the pizzazz with which she brought the spirit of the Rio street carnival to the South Bank suggests she’s on the way to making it here, too.
Anitta, 26, sang with Madonna on the latter’s Madame X album, although the way she led her male and female dancers through welldrilled routines owed more to Beyonce’s Formation tour. With its video effects, confetti showers, plumes of dry ice and a superb backing band, this was an arenaready spectacle.
Singing in Portuguese, Spanish and English, Anitta’s blend of Latin grooves and energetic moves proved irresistible to a sell-out crowd.
A backing vocalist or two might have eased the load on her lithe, sassy soprano voice, but she still pulled off the tricky task of singing while engaging in some very Brazilian twerking. Bang, from 2015, was an infectious funk workout and the Madonna number, Faz Gostoso, a thunderous samba tune.
Amid the tumult, there was one reflective interlude, with male singer Caetano Veloso appearing via a pre-recorded video link for a bossa nova ballad. The 77-year-old Veloso helped to found Brazil’s Tropicalia movement and is a cultural hero in his homeland.
With an English language album in the pipeline, Anitta’s surely bound for bigger stages.
MELtDoWN continues tonight with a Eurythmics evening featuring Dave Stewart and Emeli Sande(southbankcentre.co.uk).