Brazilian Guitarist Helena Meirelles Dies at 81

One of Brazil´s greatest guitar-players has died in Campo Grande
(MS). 81 years of age, Helena Meirelles died of chronic pneumonia.

Helena was already in her 70s when she recorded her first album for Eldorado (in
1994), followed by two others in 1996 and 1997. She learned to play the viola caipira (a small acoustic guitar) when she was 17
years of age. At the time she was married but abandoned her husband for a
musician from Paraguay. She soon left him for a third husband with whom she had
eleven
children.

In 1993, “Guitar Player” magazine placed her in the top one hundred guitarists
in the world. She performed mainly polcas, rasqueados, xotes guarânias and
rancheiras.