Colleen Kitchen and Laura Zaerr have been collaborating since the 90's. Their first band, "Heather Breeze," was active doing dances and festivals including the inaugural daVinci days The two collaborated on a number of classical endeavors as well in the ensuing decades, as both are classically trained. But meanwhile the jazz roots were beckoning. While Colleen crashed Neal Grandstaff's jazz improv class at Oregon State, Laura had been sitting in with Winston McCullough's Gratitude jazz ensemble and discovering ways to make the big harp work for jazz. With a natural gift for improvisation, and inspired by Dorothy Ashby Colleen and Laura developed ways to tag team harp and keyboard. The bright brilliant choros and bossa novas of Brazil seemed especially suited to the sound of the harp. You can't have a Brasil band without percussion, and when expert percussionist Kevin Ronkko joined the group, it was just the ticket to make manifest the groove that was driving the music.
The group played for a while with no name, and everyone was telling them they needed a name. It was the drought year of 2015, not only dry, but very hot. The band was rehearsing the song "Chovendo na Roseira" and all the references to good nurturing rain were making everyone thirsty. Someone remarked that we could use a dose of "Chuva Boa" (good rain) right about now, and the name stuck. Below is a video of Brazilian icon Gal Costa performing "Chovendo na Roseira" (to be replaced with our own when we get a nice clean one.)