João Gomes transforms Rock in Rio into a great frevo procession and celebrates his career on the Sunset stage

This Saturday (12), the artist from Pernambuco returned to the festival to sing alongside what he called Orquestra Brasileira — a band assembled especially for the performance.

His first visit to the festival took place in 2022, alongside Pedro Sampaio, at Arena Itaú, a promotional stage. Four years later, his career is already different.

The artist went from piseiro's bet to Brazil's favorite. Along the way, he sang with Roberto Carlos, recorded with Gilberto Gil, was praised by Caetano Veloso, entered the studio with Marisa Monte, created the successful Dominguinho project alongside Jota.Pê and Mestrinho, and was awarded a Latin Grammy award.

With such recognition, it was no surprise to see the excitement of the public in front of the artist's stage.

João's show started before he even went on the Sunset Stage. While J Balvin sang on Palco Mundo, the Brazilian gathered a procession that passed through the Rock in Rio audience, with various symbols of Carnival: banners, The Midnight Man, a key like Cariri's (which opens the party in Pernambuco), Boi da Macuca, a group of stilts, dolls from Olinda (representing João, Chico Science and Gonzagão) and so on.

All this as much as possible in the festival environment, of course. The frevo orchestra ended up mixing with the sound of the pop music that was playing in branded stands, which gave a slight break to João's Carnival. Even so, many people gathered to follow the procession and joined the wave.

It was a good way to bring together an audience that might otherwise have dispersed. If someone was at Sunset and intended to go to Palco Mundo, they ended up joining the irresistible “street party”. Whoever was sitting waiting for a show later got up. It's not every day that Rock in Rio becomes Carnival.

After just over an hour of the parade, João entered the stage a few minutes late and with his guitarist performing a beautiful solo of one of his biggest hits, "Eu tem asenha".

João entered the stage accompanied by an orchestra with musicians and sounds from different states. Violins, violas, flutes and cellos were connected to instruments linked to various traditions in the country, such as fifes from Caruaru and drums from Maranhão.

Even in the middle of a different project, João did not lose his essence -- a combination of lightness, friendliness and improvisations -- that won over so many audiences and artists and created “Deusa de Itamaracá” and “Dengo”.

The speakers on the left side of the stage failed exactly between one track and the next, but it didn't diminish the excitement of the audience, who said several times that they had never seen Sunset so full.

The singer also performed other tracks from his repertoire before bringing his award-winning project “Dominguinho”, a partnership with Mestrinho and Jota.Pê, to the stage. “I remembered us” and “Arriadin por tu” moved the audience.

The singer, who was already emotional when talking about participating in Rock in Rio, couldn't hold back his tears when he was surprised by Mestrinho's hug, who minutes before was performing on another stage. "I rehearsed so much for you to make me cry like that, don't do that", said João.

In addition to exploring his career, João paid homage to northeastern composers with a medley featuring “Confidências” (by Jorge de Altinho and Petrúcio Amorim), “Anjo Querubim” (Petrúcio Amorim) and “Ai, Que Saudade D'Ocê” (Vital Farias). Then, he brought “Frevo Mulher”, by Zé Ramalho, sharing the vocals with the Pernambuco maestro Spok, who has a great history associated with frevo.

João closed the performance with two hits by Assisão, one of the legends of forró, but who dreamed of being a rocker. “The four seasons” and “Fogueirinha” set the tone of the June dance for the public. But before that, he sang “My piece of sin” and “Mete a block ele”.

The young artist recently commented that back in 2022, he considered it “practically impossible” to imagine the piseiro occupying one of the main stages of Rock in Rio. For the singer, the new invitation represents the work carried out since then to expand the space of the genre in Brazilian music. On stage, he mentioned a few times that he didn't believe he was there. And that he was, "possibly, doing something very important for our forró".

In one of his hits, João sings that he cast his lot on the road and tries to be better every day. He has achieved this with great grace. After all, he has the password to run everywhere. Live, John.