The Girl from Ipanema

Jobim wrote the music in 1962 and Vinícius de Moraes wrote the Portuguese words, for a musical comedy then in progress called Dirigível. The first title was Menina que Passa. The song was inspired by Helô Pinheiro, then a 17-year-old who walked past the Veloso bar-café in Ipanema on her way to the beach. The first commercial recording was made in 1962 by Pery Ribeiro.

At the New York sessions in March 1963, Norman Gimbel supplied English lyrics on the second day. Astrud sang the English chorus after João's Portuguese one, and she said Getz told her the song would make her famous. Taylor said later that he knew it would be a smash from the moment she came in with her little voice and that accent. Who suggested she sing is disputed: she said it was João, the historian Ruy Castro said it was her own idea, and Phil Ramone said she volunteered in the control room.

The 1964 single dropped João's Portuguese vocals and credited her in full. It reached number five on the Billboard Hot 100, spent two weeks at number one on the Easy Listening chart, and went to 29 in Britain. The 1964 Verve recording entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000 and the Library of Congress National Recording Registry in 2004. In Oliveira v. Frito-Lay (2001) the Second Circuit rejected her claim to trademark rights in the recording.