Simply, this CD transcend the frontiers of music. Perfect in musical content and in spiritual force, Tábua De Esmeralda is just a master piece!

In my life, I've always been searching for the perfect sound much like a surfer attempts to find the perfect wave. I don't play music, but I listen, I listen with the best of them. My tastes are wide ranging, eclectic and discerning. I'm always open minded, and on the look out for anything I haven't heard but might like.

But even when I've found a sound that I really love, and that sounds like what I've always been looking for(such as Stereolab), a wanderlust always crops up again, and thats how it should be, if we only listened to the same thing we'd become stagnant. That said, even as I go on to other music, I'd always wanted to know that I wouldn't be going on to greater music, that the music I had found was for now the pinnacle of what I'd always wanted to hear.

Jorge Ben is that sound. To me, he is the single greatest musician songwriter in the world that ever was. His sound is utterly unique and majestic, rhythmic, soulfull, spiritual, poetic, perfect. Perfect. Nothing is perfect. Except his music. The only perfect thing in an imperfect universe.

This album is spectacular. I recommend it more highly than any other. Ben is a vocal vertuoso always. A master songwriter. A man who found his inner voice and sound and nailed it down and just couldn't fail to write a mesmerizing rhythmic masterpiece.

Another reviewer here really hit it on the head when he said that Ben went 10 yrs where every year he produced a masterpiece. I have many of those masterpieces. I recommend them all.

Its quite amazing that a musician of this caliber can't even get his albums sold on Amazon. Its really a travesty that I had to go to another rare cd site for Negro E Lindo, Ben, and his collaboration with Gilberto Gil. If you're even reading this and you're American, you've traveled quite a long way off the beaten path and really discovered a musical Shangri-la. Enjoy it. You're in a special place.

This album simply sounds amazing. It's primarily driven by Jorge Ben's ultra-funky guitar playing; imagine choppy funk guitar, but played in a Spanish guitar, with a samba influence to all of it; it's got a really unique sound that really must be heard to be grasped. The one other group I'm familiar with that has a similar guitar sound is Caf� Tacuba (especially their first two albums), but it's not quite the same.

The rest of the band is also wonderful; the drum kit and synth really drive songs like "Os Alquimistas Est�o Chegando" over the top. The songs are wonderfully composed and arranged. They make a sophisticated virtue of straightforwardness; or in other words, it's amazing how such sophisticated songs can sound so simple. Jorge's singing shows great variety and effortless spontaneity. I was going to list my favorite tracks, but realized that except for "Brother", they're all great...A must-have.