
Sem Fio – Tuning into the Novas Frequências Festival
13 June, 2025Novas Frequências is a music festival based in Rio that reaches its 15th edition this year. This is something to celebrate, as putting on an annual music festival that explores new and experimental tendencies in Brazilian music is no easy task.
The short film below, directed by Ivan Nishitani of OLHO&DEDO, focuses on last year’s edition and features the voices and music of artists that have been featured and supported here in Sounds and Colours, including Caxtrinho, Podeserdesligado, Valesuchi, Vera Fischer Era Clubber and M. Takara & Carla Boregas. It’s a stunningly shot film, with photography by Gabryel Matos, far from the picture postcard images of Rio de Janeiro. More importantly, it shows the precariousness of making new music in a city which often verges on chaos, primarily socially, but also musically.
I managed to see one event that was part of the festival in 2022 where we, the spectators, were stood round a waterfall on the side of a mountain listening to the sounds of nature intertwined with a shamanic ambient drone. It was all quite spectacular, demonstrating that the festival attempts to find that sweet spot between performance, art installation and concert.
The festival’s curator, Chico Dub, spoke about the difficulties of running this festival: “Innovation, risk-taking, and experimental formats are being pushed to the margins. Emerging voices and underground movements are being suffocated by an ecosystem that favors scale, repetition, and corporate control—leaving little space for those who truly challenge the status quo.” This is demonstrated in the increasingly crowded festival circuit in Brazil at the moment, where artists take second place to commercial interests. However, in regard to this year’s NF festival Chico defiantly adds, “… despite the lack of funding, the festival will take place—just as it did in 2022, when we pulled it off without any sponsorship. This year, we’ll be in Rio during the first week of December, and in São Paulo the following week.”
Hopefully, Sounds and Colours will be there to see what Chico will pull out of his hat to surprise us. In the meantime, you can get a good idea of what the festival offers from the film below.
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