Moacir Santos’s Centenary Brings First Festival in His Hometown and New Push to Reissue His Work

Overview

• On Sunday, July 26, 2026, Flores in Pernambuco hosted the inaugural Festival Ouro Negro do Pajeú, where local and visiting musicians performed Santos’s repertoire to mark his 100th birthday.
• Santos is best known for the 1965 album Coisas, a centerpiece of his craft that combines baião, maracatu, samba and jazz into advanced arrangements for big bands and orchestras.
• Musicians and producers say Santos taught and influenced generations of Brazilian artists—students and collaborators include Nara Leão, Baden Powell, João Donato and arrangers who learned his orchestral techniques.
• Renewed efforts to reissue and reconstruct his catalogue are underway, including attempts to republish the 2001 Ouro Negro tribute project that reconstructed lost arrangements and reintroduced his music to Brazil.
• Despite esteem in jazz and musician circles, Santos remains little known to much of the Brazilian public, and supporters hope festival programming, education projects and reissues will draw younger listeners and expand his mainstream recognition.