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Brazil's origins - the Indians with
their reed flutes, the Portuguese with their singers and viola players,
and the Africans with their many thrilling rhythms - make it a musical
country. From the classical compositions of Villa-Lobos, to the soft
sounds of bossa nova, to the driving beat of samba, Brazil has developed
music of striking sophistication, quality and diversity.
When the Jesuit fathers first arrived
in Brazil they found that the Indians performed ritual song and dances
accompanied by rudimentary wind an percussion instruments. The Jesuits
made use of the music to catechise the Indians by replacing th original
words with religious ones using the Tupi language. They also introduced
the Gregorian chant and taught the flute, bow instruments, and the
clavichord. Music accompanied the sacramental ceremonies which were
performed in village and church plazas.
African music was introduced during
the colony's first century and was enriched by its contact with Iberian
music. One of the most importar types of music used by the Negro slaves
was the comic song-dance called Lundu. For a long time it was one of
the typical popular musical forms and it was even sung in the Portuguese
Court during the 19th century. In the second half of the 18th century
and during the 19th century the sentimental love song called the modinha
was popular and it was sung both in Brazil's salons and at the Portuguese
Court. No one knows if the modinha was born in Brazil or in Portugal.
Schools of music existed in Bahia
in the early 17th century and religious music was played in churches
throughout the colony. As with other art forms, musical activity intensified
with the arrival of the Royal Family in 1808. King João VI,
a music lover, sent to Europe for the composer Marcos Portugal, and
for Sigismund von Neukomm, an Austrian pianist, a pupil of Haydn. Local
musicians also attracted the King's attention, such as José Maurício
Nunes Garcia (1767-1830) who was a notable improviser on the organ
and clavichord. João VI appointed him Inspector to the Royal
Chapel, a body which had more than 100 instrumentalists and singers,
many of whom were foreigners.
By the end of the century, Carlos
Gomes (1836-1896), born in the town of Campinas in the state of São
Paulo, produced a number of operas in the prevailing Italian style,
especially il guarany, an opera based on a famous Brazilian novel by
José de Alencar about a colonial villain who incites an Indian
attack in order to gain a Portuguese nobleman's treasure and his daughter
as a bride. Brasílio Itiberê (1848-1913) was the first
Brazilian composer to use a popular national motif in erudite music.
His 1869 composition, A Sertaneja (The Country Maiden) was played by
Franz Liszt and has remained active in piano repertoires.
As in literature and painting, the
Week of Modern Art in 1922 revolutionized Brazilian music and brought
acceptance to a crop of new composers. Led by Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887-1959),
they brought avant-garde techniques from Europe and undertook the challenge
of transplanting Brazilian folkloric melodies and rhythms to symphonic
compositions. Their music often incorporated many popular musical instruments
into classical orchestras.
After a time, two principal trends
in Brazilian music became identifiable. Writer Mário de Andrade
had advocated that composers should seek inspiration in national life
with special emphasis on Brazil's musical folklore. Composer Camargo
Guarnieri, an adherent of Andrade, heads the musical school known as "Nationalist".
Other composers in this group include: Luciano Gallet (1893-1931),
Oscar Lorenzo Fernandez (1897-1948), Francisco Mignone (1897-1986),
Radamés Gnatalli (1906-1988), and Guerra Peixe (1914-). In widely
differing compositions, these composers searched for a national language
which would not lose the universal character of musical language. After
1939, another musical school began to assert itself principally as
a result of the work carried out by Hans Joachim Koellreutter, the
creator of the Live Music Group. This group made up of Cláudio
Santoro (1919-1990), Eunice Catunda (1926-), Edino Krieger (1928-),
and others based their music on the universality of musical language.
They defended the use of atonalism and dodecaphonism as composition
resources.
Brazil's popular music developed
parallel to its classical music and it also united traditional European
instruments - guitar, piano, and flute - with a whole rhythm section
of sounds produced by frying pans, small barrels with a membrane and
a stick inside (cuícas) that make wheezing sounds, and tambourines.
During the 1930's Brazilian popular music played on the radio became
a powerful means of mass communication. Three of the best known composers
of this period are Noel Rosa, Lamartine Babo, and Ary Barroso (1903-1963).
Barroso's principal singer, Carmen Miranda, went on to achieve an international
reputation when she appeared in a series of Hollywood films.
In the mid 1960's, the haunting,
story-telling lyric of The Girl From Ipanema, carried by a rich melodic
line, was the first big international hit to emerge from the bossa
nova movement of Brazilian singers and composers. It put Brazilian
popular music on the map and brought instant fame to composer Tom Jobim
and lyricist-poet Vinicius de Moraes.
The bossa nova appeared in Rio de
Janeiro in the late 1950's. At first it was played as an intimate music
in the apartments of Rio's middle and upper-middle classes. The music
mingled the Brazilian samba beat with American jazz. Later on bossa
nova became a trademark of a new concept of music - a little sad, sometimes
sung off-key, and where the lyrics have great importance. For that
reason, in Brazil, the association of modern poets with pop composers
(Vinícius de Moraes, Chico Buarque, Tom Jobim, Luiz Bonfá,
and Baden Powell) was an enormous success.
In 1968, in a period of dictatorship,
urban guerrillas, and anxiety about how to change the political system,
the Tropicalists appeared - Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, and Gal Costa.
Tropicalism can be described as a blending of international music (such
as Latin beats and rock'n'roll) with national rhythms. It is very much
its own creation: lyrical, intelligent, with faster tempos and fuller
rhythms than bossa nova.
Popular regional music in Brazil includes the forró from
the northeast where the accordion and the flute join guitars and percussion
in a footstomping country dance; the frevo also from the northeast,
which has an energetic, simple style; the chorinho (literally "little
tears") from Rio which combines various types and sizes of guitars,
flutes, percussions, and an occasional clarinet or saxophone in a tender
form of instrumental music; and the internationally successful lambada.
When danced, lambada is sensual and fast-paced; it got its name from
the Portuguese verb to whip or flog referring to the smacking of thigh
against thigh. But the most typical of Brazilian popular music is the
seductive rhythm of the samba. No one is sure of the exact origin of
samba. Some people believe that samba was born in the streets of Rio
de Janeiro with contributions from three different cultures - Portuguese
courtly songs, African rhythms and native Indian fast footwork. Others
believe samba is simply African in origin and that it evolved from
the batuque, a music based on percussion instruments and hand clapping.
Today in Brazil, popular music continues to explore new rhythms and
new melodies. Its interpreters and composers make use of all music's
resources to compete for and please the world's many music audiences.
Some of the well-known performers are: Gilberto Gil, Maria Betânia,Alcione,
Roberto Carlos, Ney Matogrosso, Rita Lee, Milton Nascimento, Hermeto
Paschoal, Fafá de Belém, Chitãozinho e Chororó,
Elba Ramalho, Alceu Valença, Djavan, Marisa Monte, Ivan Lins,
João Bosco, Cazuza(*), Luiz Gonzaga(*), Luiz Gonzaga Jr.(*),
Elis Regina(*).
(*) although now deceased, the last
four names should be remembered.
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