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Art & Creativity Quote by Herbie Mann

"For me Brazilian music is the perfect mix of melody and rhythm. It just bubbles rhythmically. If I had to pick just one music style to play if would be Brazilian"

About this Quote

Herbie Mann isn’t just complimenting Brazilian music here; he’s staking out an aesthetic home base. The phrasing is tellingly physical: “perfect mix,” “bubbles,” “rhythmically.” That verb choice turns rhythm into something alive and irrepressible, not a grid you count but a force that rises on its own. Coming from a jazz flutist known for crossing borders, it’s also a quiet manifesto: the best music isn’t the most complex on paper, it’s the kind that makes your body understand it before your brain does.

The subtext is a critique of jazz’s occasional drift toward self-serious virtuosity. Mann doesn’t praise Brazilian music for being exotic; he praises it for solving a musician’s eternal problem: how to keep melody singable while rhythm stays deep, propulsive, and inevitable. Brazilian styles (samba, bossa nova, and the broader MPB universe) are masters of that balance - the groove can be intricate, but the surface still feels effortless. “It just bubbles” is basically an argument for pleasure as a legitimate musical value.

Context matters: mid-to-late 20th century American jazz was in constant dialogue with Brazilian music, especially after bossa nova’s global wave and the jazz-Brazil hybrids that followed. Mann’s “If I had to pick just one” reads like a professional’s admission that, when everything else is stripped away, he’d choose the tradition that reliably delivers lift, warmth, and motion - music that can be sophisticated without losing its smile.

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TopicMusic
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APA Style (7th ed.)
Mann, Herbie. (2026, January 17). For me Brazilian music is the perfect mix of melody and rhythm. It just bubbles rhythmically. If I had to pick just one music style to play if would be Brazilian. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/for-me-brazilian-music-is-the-perfect-mix-of-68940/

Chicago Style
Mann, Herbie. "For me Brazilian music is the perfect mix of melody and rhythm. It just bubbles rhythmically. If I had to pick just one music style to play if would be Brazilian." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/for-me-brazilian-music-is-the-perfect-mix-of-68940/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"For me Brazilian music is the perfect mix of melody and rhythm. It just bubbles rhythmically. If I had to pick just one music style to play if would be Brazilian." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/for-me-brazilian-music-is-the-perfect-mix-of-68940/. Accessed 10 Feb. 2026.

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Herbie Mann on Brazilian Music: Melody and Rhythm
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About the Author

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Herbie Mann (April 16, 1930 - June 1, 2003) was a Musician from USA.

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