Elisa Macedo Dekaney sees her music as a community experience.

That’s why she founded the Brazilian music ensemble, Samba Laranja, at Syracuse University with her husband Joshua Dekaney, a percussion instructor and director of the Career Development Center at the Setnor School of Music, in 2001. 

“I think the music itself is very captivating. It’s good music, it’s accessible,” Dekaney said. “The music (is) about community, anyone can play it.”

On Tuesday, the group will release its third album “Pathways” and will perform at 8 p.m. in Setnor Auditorium.

Through the group’s music, Dekaney, an associate professor and chair of the department of music education, has brought Brazilian culture to SU for over a decade.

Dekaney narrates three pieces on the album, two of which are Brazilian folktales accompanied by improvised music. She also created several original compositions and said the narration and originality of the album are part of what make it interesting.

“I think this album is special because it escapes the traditional format of just having music, just having melodies and rhythm,” Dekaney said. “I think the stories are a step into connecting music and literature, (with) free composition and improvisation. I think that’s really interesting, and I think I got to put a lot more in this album than I did in the other ones.”

Samba Laranja, which means “Orange Samba” in Portuguese, is a class taught every semester by Dekaney and her husband. It is available to all SU and State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry students regardless of their musical experience or major.

“It was a great thing to make Brazilian music known to American students,” Dekaney said. “I feel very privileged to get to share the music of my country, my culture, the kind of music that I grew up in.”

From day one of class, the members of the ensemble learn to play Brazilian music, even if they have no experience.

“We pretty much throw them right into the deep end,” Joshua Dekaney said. “You don’t have to have ever played anything before and we can just give you some sticks, give you some mallets, teach you the parts right on the spot and start putting everybody together and play together right away.”

The group performed six shows at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City on Oct. 24 and 25. Graduate student and ensemble member Claire Wilcox said the performances allowed the group to better understand Brazilian music.

“The festival in NYC was incredible because we really got to experience the whole idea behind Brazilian music as a life force genre of music being put to work,” Wilcox said. “We got to see how the audience reacts, how they take in the music. There was a Brazilian dancer who just got up and started dancing with us, and all these people started coming in and dancing and that’s kind of what the style of music breathes.”

The Dekaneys make an effort to include the talents of various musicians in the group. Instruments like the violin and flute have been used in arrangements based off of the talents of group members. Next semester, the group will be experimenting with traditional African drums and accordions.

Group members change every semester depending on who takes the class, but some students, like senior music education major Stephanie Mata, return for multiple semesters. Mata has been in the group since her sophomore year and said part of the reason the group is able to successfully work together is due to how the Dekaneys treat their students.

“They respect us and we respect them,” Mata said. “They treat us as valued musicians. Even if you don’t have a musical background, they will treat you as a musician and I think that’s why we do so well.”

Published on November 11, 2014 at 12:01 am

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