It's Brazil's Independence Day today, but national self-esteem may be at a low ebb, having hosted the football World Cup this summer only to be brutally kicked out in the semi-finals by Germany.
In samba and bossa nova, however, the Brazilians still dominate, although Germany has some fine exponents of these Brazilian musical styles - harmonica and vibraphone virtuoso Hendrik Meurkens springs to mind.
Brazilian music is particularly popular in Hong Kong at the moment, perhaps because we have some talented Brazilian musicians living here. Among them is pianist Joao Mascarenhas, who leads his band Sambrasia at Grappa's Cellar on Saturday.
After a quiet summer for gigs at Grappa's - partly because it was screening World Cup matches - the venue is back to its live music emphasis, and this is the first big production show of the autumn.
Vocalist Angelita Li joins music director Mascarenhas, bassist Victor Geronimo, saxophonist Oliver Smith, guitarist Jordie Guzman, and percussionists Sernande Floro and Tobe Kushiator to pay tribute to some Brazilian musical heroes.
Composers and performers whose music the band will be playing include Gilberto Gil, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Baden Powell de Aquino, Ivan Lins, Djavan, Elis Regina, Beth Carvalho, Jorge Aragao, Airto Moreira, Carlinhos Brown, Luiz Gonzaga, Zeca Pagodinho, Jorge Ben and the band Demonios da Garoa, among other masters.
Brazilian classical composer Heitor Villa-Lobos introduced international audiences to music inspired by folk traditions as early as the 1920s. However it was not until the bossa nova movement of the 1950s, which combined elements of samba with jazz, that a distinctively Brazilian sound entered the popular music mainstream.