By Scott Adams, Publisher

“And the winner is”: There were a lot of Brazilian musical greats receiving statuettes this past Thursday night at the Latin Grammys, which – unlike last year when the Brazilian ceremony was held separately in São Paulo – was held once again at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Daniela Mercury, the Brazilian female performer with most #1 hits in the country, performed on stage.

Caetano Veloso picked up two awards, for Best Singer-Songwriter Album (Zii e Zie) and with Roberto Carlos to win the award for Best Long Form Music Video with ‘E A Música De Tom Jobim’.

Ivan Lins picked up Best MPB Album honors for his ‘Regência: Vince Mendoza’ with The Metropole Orchestra. “Martelo Bigorna” was named Best Brazilian song. The song was performed and written by upcoming MPB star Lenine. Brazil’s evergreen pop group Roupa Nova won for Best Brazilian Contemporary Pop Album for their release ‘Em Londres’ (In London).

Martinho da Vila received his Grammy for Best Samba Album, ‘O Pequeno Burguês!!’. Daniel was honored with Best Native Brazilian Roots Album for ‘As Músicas do Filme O Menino da Porteira’, while Elba Ramalho took top honors in the Best Tropical Brazilian Roots Album category for ‘Balaio De Amo’. Other winners included Sérgio Reis for Best Sertaneja Music Album, and a double award for NX Zero & Titãs for Best Brazilian Rock Album. The piano music of Heitor Villa-Lobos performed by Sonia Rubinsky was honored for Best Classical Album.

This year marked the 10^th annual edition of the Latin Grammy awards, and surprisingly, Brazil leads the awards list, with 97 – tied with Mexico. All in all, a very worthy and very credible winners list, especially considering the challenges the music world is experiencing right now.