São Paulo, Brazil to St. John’s Newfoundland in Canada is almost 8,000 kilometers, a distance that likely a young girl named Ana Luísa Ramos thought she would never travel when she was singing in a children’s choir, let alone make St. John’s her home, many years later. Proud of her Brazilian heritage, but obviously proud of her home in recent years, Newfoundland, Ana, her husband Eric and their family have not only traveled together across great distances but also have had a musical journey together that started many years ago. Ana Luísa Ramos sat down with Riveting Riffs Magazine over a Zoom call to talk about her life, career and took us back the very beginning.

She begins, “I was born in Ribeirão Preto and that means Black River. In the city we have this river and it used to be a big river. Now it is not that big and not that clean anymore. I was born in 1988. I always loved music. My parents are not musicians. From my mom’s side her grandma and her brothers, they used to play and sing and paint, but music is very present in my culture and people are very much connected to music.

I have always had music at my house and I had many diverse influences. My father loves Brazilian music, but he also is a Beatles fan and all of the sixties Rock bands. My brothers, I have two older brothers and they were the ones who introduced me to MTV. We used to see what was happening in the U.K. and in the U.S. I remember the first time I saw Pink Floyd (big smile).

I started singing in choirs and my grandma, my father’s mom, loves Classical music. At the time we would listen to music on CDs. There was this magazine that if you bought the weekly issue, you would receive a different CD every week. There were many composers.

My grandma is a very simple person who only did primary school, but she would love to listen to music. She was a housewife. She stayed home, cleaning, cooking and taking care of the grandkids. I still remember listening to all of the Opera singers and the Classical music. I would sing with my (she does air quotes) Opera voice. My mom decided to put me in a choir (Her eyes sparkle as she remembers). I still love to listen to Classical music. That is how I started and I was very (much) a perfectionist. This was Coral Infantil da Cia Minaz (Children's Choir) at the Teatro Minaz.

It was a very different experience. We would have theory music classes for the first half hour and then we would have the choir rehearsal. We would sing Brazilian Folk songs, but also, we would sing Vivaldi and Mozart. We would sing The Magic Flute for Mozart We would sing in many different languages. For me it was a whole different world and I loved that. I loved  being with the orchestra and the adult choir, singing and rehearsing. That is how I started and I never stopped singing.”

Ana Luísa Ramos became a teenager and she joined the Orquestra Sinfônica de Ribeirão Preto (Ribeirão Preto Symphony Orchestra).

“It is the symphony from my hometown and it is one of the oldest symphonies in the whole country. A couple of years ago I had an amazing concert with them.

I think I had a beautiful voice, but I think I was lucky. You know when you are in the right place at the right time. One day one of the singers was not there, so the conductor said Ana, sing the solo. (Big smile) I did it and I never stopped.

I was very responsible and I already knew that is what I wanted to do with my life. I was also invited to join the events choir, so we would sing at weddings or for special celebrations. We had a Classical repertoire. I am not even sure if people would do that now, but I remember if it was my town’s anniversary they would do a special mass at the cathedral. They would do one of Mozart’s or (Giuseppi) Verdi’s (music) instead of reading we would sing.

For me that was my life and I remember my friends and family and teenagers would go to parties. Sometimes I would go, before I would sing at a wedding, because that is how I paid for my singing lessons,” she says. 

As for the events choir Ana Luísa Ramos explains, “This group would be called the Chamber Choir and it was all from Companhia Minaz and they are still there at Ribeirão Preto and they have their own theater (Teatro Minaz) now and a lot of groups. It is a beautiful project because with Children’s and youth choirs, adult choirs, chamber choirs and musical theater (Editor’s notes they have produced full scale productions such as, Jesus Christ Superstar and Hair. Founded and directed by maestra Gisele Ganade and producer Ivo Rinhel D’Acol.)  They also have spaces for rehearsal and it is a very nice initiative that they have there.”

Now at the ripe old age of eighteen (we say that jokingly) Ana Luísa Ramos decided she wanted to work professionally in music. I loved being a Classical singer I always loved singing more popular music. (Antônio Carlos) Jobim is my favorite composer.

I moved to São Paulo state three hours from São Paulo (the city) and then I joined the state choir. It was a choir for professional students. You were paid to participate. You received a scholarship and a stipend. I started teaching and singing everywhere that I could from restaurants and weddings to events. I did it for many years until I met my husband, Eric.

When Eric and I started dating he invited me to start singing with him. For me it was a new world, because I was always a soprano. I would always sing the melodies. This was my first time with original music and we recorded a few albums.

In 2016 when we were already married, I said I think I want to have my own (music career). That (first album) was Um, which means One. I asked him to write some songs for me, because I truly did not think I was able to write music. I was always the interpreter, the performer, but not the songwriter. Eric wrote some songs for me.

I also wanted (to record) some songs that I had always loved. At the time it was harder to receive permission to record (for instance) a Jobim song. In Brazil to record a song, you need the permission of the owners of the rights for the song. It is not always that the owners of the rights are their family. Sometimes it is a publishing house. Sometimes with the contracts you don’t own the masters, you don’t own the music. I had a few songs recorded as covers, but I only received permission for three.

It was so expensive that I recorded "Manhã de Carnaval," (composer Luiz Bonfá and lyricist Antônio Maria) and “Carinhoso,” (Alfredo da Rocha Viana Filho (Music) and João de Barro (Lyrics)). I also recorded a Jazz standard “Someone To Watch Over Me,” (George and Ira Gershwin). I love that song.

Your second album Amanheceu was released in 2021. Did your approach to this record changed at all from Um?

“With the first album I started performing mostly in São Paulo and São Paulo state. At the time my husband was doing a master’s with a Scottish university. It was an online course, but he needed to be there for one of the assignments or meetings. It was for music and the environment. He was the first student outside of Europe. It was a very exciting time. We were in Scotland for almost a month.

There was a three-day conference and I joined them one day for a workshop. It was about creative writing. We were on a small island. This creative workshop’s goal was for us to write about the environment. When I completed my work, I thought this could be a song. For two years I didn’t do anything with it.

I asked my friend Bruno (Zibordi) who produced the album to write the music, because I was already thinking about the (next) album. I said can you write the music for me? I have the lyrics. I teach voice and one day between classes I was playing a bit on the piano with my lyrics and that is how I wrote my first song “Cold Summer,” from Amanheceu was my first song (for which) I wrote lyrics and music. Then I never stopped. Five of the songs are originals and five are songs that Eric wrote for me,” says  Ana Luísa Ramos.

Continuing she talks about her songwriting, “I have been learning how to play the guitar for maybe fifteen years now and I still am very bad. Sometimes for a stretch I practice more, but it is not my main focus. I think it is an easy instrument to play, but to play it well is very difficult. I would try to play songs that I like. I started writing more songs like this (on the guitar). 

Most of my songs come when I am not trying to write something. For me sometimes I have an idea (she motions towards her head) or sometimes in notes on my phone. After a while I forget about them and then I go oh I found this. This happens a lot. The first song I wrote is “Coming Back.”

I wrote a song, “Coming Home,” a love song, right after I moved here, I started going to a lot of open mics to meet people and to hear what they would play. We don’t have open mics in Brazil. Most of the places (in Newfoundland) that have live music have one night a week or one night a month with an open mic. I started going to a few only a few blocks from my house. A lot of people moved here. Some of them are not professionals, but only for a hobby, so that song was inspired by these experiences.

Although, I was already a professional (singer) since I was thirteen years old it was my first time living abroad and working only with my original music. Back in Brazil I used to do a lot of covers. I would put my songs here and there and I would do shows with my songs. Sometimes I would sing Bossa Nova, Jazz Standards or Pop music. When I moved here and found I can play more of my music I was very happy.

We moved here in August of 2019 and my goal was I will move to (Canada) and then I will go back to Brazil to teach and perform. That is what I did for the first six months. At the time it was not as expensive (to travel) as it is now. Now it is way  more expensive after COVID. I had a lot of shows, so it was feasible at the time. Then the pandemic started and the borders were closed and I was here.

I was recording this album in Brazil, so the times that I went back to Brazil I would go to the studio and I would record a few more songs. I had to pause the recordings and I started writing different songs. The album was merged between my life in Brazil and my life now in Canada.

During this time, I wrote two more songs and I had to record again all of the vocals, but I recorded them from my home studio here. It was the same producer, but the album came out in 2021. It was in the summer of 2021.

(In Brazil) Eric would record guitar for my albums and write some songs, I would sing backing vocals with him and play the piano, but when we moved here, we didn’t have a band anymore. My music was always more Bossa Nova, Brazilian music and Jazz inclined and this album was more Folk and into Rock. When we moved here, we would play as a show, so we would play some of my songs, some of Eric’s songs and some covers.”

For someone whose first language is Portuguese and only moved to Canada in 2019, with only a slight trace of an accent Ana Luísa Ramos’ English is impeccable.

She explains, “I learned a little bit at school, because we had English as a language, but nobody learns much. It is like hi, how are you? I am pleased to meet you. My name is something. For you to find your pace and really interacting with people it takes a very long time. I think listening to a lot of music (helped) and I started reading in English when I was a teenager and into my early twenties. I then started traveling and I would go to Europe or even to the U.S. or Canada, but I think I really improved my English after moving here (Newfoundland) and speaking it on a daily basis.”

For those not familiar with Canada’s geography from the eastern most province Newfoundland and the western most part of Canada, Vancouver Island it is approximately 8,000 kilometers, so we wondered what drew Ana and Eric to Newfoundland.

“Because Eric came to study. The program (he is in now) while finishing his PhD is one of the best. He applied to the University of Toronto and I thought we should move to Toronto, but Eric was always talking about Newfoundland. He would show me pictures and for five years he said he wanted to live here. In the end we moved here. Sometimes I now wonder if we had moved to Toronto we might have gone back to Brazil (because of the cost of living). Here we are able to live in a house with bedrooms and we have a basement. This is my studio (where she was Zooming from) and Eric has an office. We pay less than a friend pays for one bedroom in Toronto. Here in the Atlantic it is more affordable to live. (They live in St John’s).

People here are so friendly. Since we are on an island we are isolated in a way, so our community here is self-sufficient regarding entertainment and the arts. Every day you have something good happening. At the same time, you can’t go to all of them and this is a city that is a little over 100,000 people. I think in the Greater St John’s area it is 200,000. Imagine my shock when coming from São Paulo where there are twelve million people and twenty million in Greater São Paulo. In my home state São Paulo state, we have more people than the entire (population) of Canada.

I am amazed how cultural this city is for our size. We have music festivals a lot and all of the time. Everyone plays, sings or paints. We have a good quality of life here. You are home by four-thirty or five. You can have supper and still go out at 7:30 or 8 and play or rehearse.

Another thing is it is so beautiful here. The ocean is always present, and we have so many lakes,” she says and you see the happiness in her eyes.

Our conversation changes direction to talk about Ana Luísa Ramos’ current album Solaris, an album for which she made a mini documentary.

“My daughter was born in November 2021. I had her in my arms for long hours. She would feed and then she would have her naps here. For many, many months she would only sleep in my arms or she would lay down on my chest. I couldn’t do anything. I was so filled with love and impressed by that tiny little thing. She was beautiful, wonderful, with big eyes and she was holding my finger. I was very happy.

I started writing many of the lyrics while holding her. It was between classes, because I was self-employed and I needed to work. One month after she was born, I was already teaching, but I don’t teach a lot of students. I would teach one or two students a day and so I always had time to practice. That is how I started most of the songs. Then I realized I had six or eight songs. I thought let me start thinking about a new album. That is how Solaris started. I had a very clear idea of what I wanted, the arrangements, the instruments and everyone who would be involved.

I was very lucky, because I was accepted into an artist residency at Brigus (Newfoundland). It is a tiny town that is maybe one hour from here. I had applied the year before, but I didn’t get in and the following year I was accepted. I was so happy, because I had two weeks to focus on the album.

I was so productive that when my residency started all my songs were ready. With my residency I didn’t write songs, I rehearsed every day for hours. I recorded there and my producer joined us.

I thought maybe we should have good photos. I had already taken the pictures I wanted for this album, but then the photographer also joined me for a day with a videographer. I said I think we should film this, because the place is very unique and the house and the cottage are very unique. It is a historical place and the view is breathtaking. Now more than ever we need to have visual.

For this album I filmed thirty seconds to one-minute videos for all of the songs, so I could promote them with the mini doc. This was a project for which I was very organized (her eyes are smiling), so before we started recording or doing things I already had everything planned. Sometimes you start doing things and you have more ideas, but you have already recorded the songs. I only recorded the songs after I had everything ready. I think that was a great thing that I did, because I saw the big picture before painting the small parts (big smile).

I think it is my best work so far. I have put more of my identity on it and all of the songs were written by me. With this album I was in the running for the songwriter of the year, so I thought maybe this is something good, but I think I stopped trying to be perfect. I think then I changed and I really don’t like this word, but I think I changed my mindset. I am from Classical music, so the word perfection is necessary.”

You, the listeners will have to decide if this is perfection, but from where we sit, you will listen to a lot of music, before you hear songs this beautiful and vocals as special as those of Ana Luísa Ramos.

You can follow Ana Luisa Ramos on Instagram or visit her website or listen to her music on her YouTube page.  Return to Our Front Page 

All Photos by Sarah Kierstead protected by copyright © All Rights Reserved

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This interview by Joe Montague  originally published January 6th, 2026 and is protected by copyright © and is the property of Riveting Riffs Magazine All Rights Reserved.  All photos and artwork are the the property of  Ana Luisa Ramos unless otherwise noted and all  are protected by copyright © All Rights Reserved. This interview may not be reproduced in print or on the internet or through any other means without the written permission of Riveting Riffs Magazine.