(Jazz/bossa nova) Adela Dalto - Exotica - 1996, MP3 (tracks), 320 kbps

Born in Texas, and raised in Gary, Indiana, Mexican-American Latin jazz singer Adela Dalto has been around the world singing on the most important stages. From the United States to Europe and Latin America to the most exotic places as Egypt, Macau, Singapore Bali and even the Galapagos. Her favorite places are Spain, the South of France, Martinique, Argentina and south Texas for food and friends. It was her late husband Jorge Dalto that encouraged her to begin a professional career singing at 19, but it was Graciela from the Mario Bauza Orchestra that inspired her most. Seeing the orchestra take up half the stage, Jorge sitting at an 11 foot piano taking up the other half, then Graciela stepping up to the mic, stage center, Adela knew then what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. Singing backup for Cecilia Cruz at Madison Square Garden two years later confirmed she would remain on the stage, "To feel the roar of the audience coming down on you and the heat of hundreds of lights is very exhilarating, you just want to stay on the stage forever singing your heart out with the audience responding." Recruited by Chico O'Farrell to sing she became one of the early Latina jingle singers in NYC while working in the jazz clubs and then becoming a resident singer in the famed Rainbow Room before she began to hit the road. In her latest review by J Hunter (2007) at the Lake George Music Festival, "The magnetic singer's best moments happened when she flushed the sorrow out of standards like Johnny Mercer's “Days of Wine and Roses" and Buffy Saint-Marie's "Until It's Time for You to Go.” Both lyrics are melancholy in the extreme, but the passionate Dalto flipped their meanings with effervescent interpretations that banished anything remotely depressing." In a concert at Jazz at Lincoln Center, she managed to delight every single soul in the house, (Univision, 2007). When she is off the road she does find time to mentor young women through an empowerment program she developed through College Now and is working on her Masters in Professional Counseling, "just to be sure I'm advising them correctly." Ms. Dalto says, "I plan to live till I'm a hundred and twenty so I'm preparing for the future. Rhythm is the bass/base line, education is the melody, creativity is the harmony, kindness is the longevity of my life".