CPH:DOX 2024 – They Shot The Piano Player

Jeff Harris, a music journalist from New York, travels to Brazil to research his next book on bossa nova. As soon as he arrives in Rio, Jeff encounters the myth of Francisco Tenório Junior, an enigmatic pianist considered one of Brazil’s leading jazz musicians who mysteriously disappeared while on tour in Buenos Aires in 1976, the year of the military coup in Argentina. Travelling around Brazil to visit some of the country’s most influential musicians, Jeff becomes fascinated by Tenório, whose story he uncovers through the memories of the people he interviews. Jeff’s eagerness to solve the mystery of Tenório’s disappearance becomes irresistible. He abandons the original focus of the book and begins to delve into the dark period when military regimes took power in many Latin American countries with the support of the CIA.