i recently heard about Silva through a friend who used to live in Boston where Silva started out as street musician at the T (Boston's subway system). at first i thought my friend was talking about Jose Gonzalez, a pretty well known classical guitarist, but as the descriptions went on, i realized 'gonzal-' was where the similarity starts and ends. most obviously, Gonzalez has a thick head of curly hair whereas Silva is bald. Silva also plays a 'headless' electric bass instead. what hooked my friend was Silva's style - it wasn't the filler bass or jazzy bass that we were used to hearing. coupled with the whole street concept, my friend went as far as creating an unofficial website for Silva that eventually became official. you can read about Silva's life as a street musician from the liner notes on Busker or listen to all the songs
here.