The Austin 100: Luedji Luna

By Stephen Thompson

Published March 5, 2019 at 5:01 AM EST

Hometown: Salvador, Brazil

Genre: Global

Why We're Excited: Brazilian singer-songwriter Luedji Luna's music surveys and celebrates the connections between her home country and her African roots, and addresses the many ways in which Afro-Brazilians and women are marginalized in Brazil and beyond. Along the way, she presides over a sound as expansive as the distances it embodies, as Afro-Brazilian rhythms and other traditional sounds meld with familiar strains of R&B, jazz and, at times, with the help of Brazilian DJ Nyack, electronic beats. In "Banho de Folhas," she serves up a fluid and laid-back slice of sunshine.

Stephen Thompson

Stephen Thompson is a writer, editor and reviewer for NPR Music, where he speaks into any microphone that will have him and appears as a frequent panelist on All Songs Considered. Since 2010, Thompson has been a fixture on the NPR roundtable podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, which he created and developed with NPR correspondent Linda Holmes. In 2008, he and Bob Boilen created the NPR Music video series Tiny Desk Concerts, in which musicians perform at Boilen's desk. (To be more specific, Thompson had the idea, which took seconds, while Boilen created the series, which took years. Thompson will insist upon equal billing until the day he dies.)

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