Kiko Pereira

Born February 13, 1970 in Newark, New Jersey where he lives till the age of 10, Kiko then moves to Portugal with his family.

Self made man he acquires a taste for singing and starts to do so in garage bands when he was 15.

At the age of 20 he moves to the student city of Coimbra. There he puts together the Zwet’on Belda Blues Band (Carlos Pascoinho, guitar; Pedro Pascoinho, drums; José Manuel Rodrigues, bass; e Miguel Monteiro, sax). It’s with this band that he starts to take interest in Jazz and Blues.

In 1994 he is invited to join the band from Oporto Bloco Central (Paulo Barros, piano; Manuel Barros, bass e Sérgio Curado, drums). This is his first encounter with Jazz, eventually he signs up in the Oporto Jazz School where he is a pupil of Portuguese jazz singer and teacher Fátima Serro.

In 1995 Fátima Serro invites him to be part of a project of hers called Trupe Vocal (Fátima Serro e Susana Baldaque, vocals; Paulo Gomes, piano, Zé Lima, bass e Mário Teixeira, drums). That participation still goes on and in 2001 they recorded the critically acclaimed “We’ll remember you” album.

Between 1996 and the beginnings of 1998 he is involved in a latin jazz band called Raul Marques e os Amigos da Salsa recording the album “Ligações Perigosas” (Polygram 1997) touring the country and playing some of the most important venues in Portugal.

1998 is the year of the band Keep Kool (Nuno Vieira, guitar; Rui Teixeira, sax; Manuel Barros, bass e Sérgio Curado, drums) and is part of the Quartet In Blue (Mário Santos, sax; Paulo Gomes, piano e Pedro Barreiros, bass) again touring the country and abroad.

By the end of 1999 with the pianist Telmo Marques starts working on other fields of music with Tri-Pop and puts together his Quintet (Paulo Gomes, piano; Pedro Barreiros, bass; Paulo Pinto, guitar e Bruno Pedroso, drums).

Because of his passion for blues he maintains a side group called “Blues Hotel” (Paulo Pinto, guitar; Jorge Filipe piano & hammond; Ricardo Rodrigues, bass e Lu�-s Filipe, drums) which plays every fortnight in a hotel in Oporto.

He was considered by one of Portugal’s leading Jazz critics as the only Jazz singer in country and has been playing regularly in clubs and festivals since.

Towards the end of 2001 he is invited to sing a song written by Portuguese jazz trumpet player Lauren Filipe for the Jazz gala of the 2001 Oporto European Cultural Capital with the Orquestra de Jazz de Matosinhos, Bob Berg, Ingrid Jensen and Conrad Herwig.

2003 is the year of his first album called “Raw”. Show less