Should histories necessarily begin at the very beginning? Maybe not; sometimes you want to say "that's how it was then, this is the way it is now, this -- I believe -- is why, and that's how it all began." Enfim...

ONCE UPON A NIGHT IN BRAZIL...

In Rio de Janeiro, in the house of a Bahia-born ialorixá who had arrived in Rio as a young woman (part of the exodus of emigrating Bahians leaving for the capital in search of work around the time of Brazil's abolishment of slavery), the music (in the front part of the house anyway, more on out back in a bit) was...

So everybody has heard of killer bees, right? The Africanized version of European honeybees? The music in the salon of Tia Ciata's house was an Africanized version of the music from which it had descended (polkas, waltzes, mazurcas) after first being played some 40 years earlier for the monied classes by musicians from Brazil's darker classes. The Brazilians took the European rhythms' metronomicity and made it -- subtly but unmistakably -- breathe, giving it ginga (sway), and in doing so freed the music to swoop, hover, dive and soar. Strange to say, this music, called choro -- or "cry" -- is almost unknown outside of Brazil, as is its killer (in oh-so-gentlemanly a way) king, Pixinguinha.

Os Oito Batutas, The Eight Batons, although "batuta" had a second, slang, meaning, rendering "The Eight Cool Guys"; Pixinguinha is on the far left.

The third selection below, entitled Um a Zero, or 1 x 0, was written by Pixinguinha (the first two compositions are his as well) to celebrate Brazil's futbol victory over Uruguay in 1919 (yeah, Brazilians were already crazy about o jogo bonito, the beautiful game, way back then!).

Listen to Pixinguinha

These guys weren't cool for nothing. Like the American jazz players whose style followed (and would later come to influence) their own, they were masters of their instruments. This was and continues to be a dominating element in choro, as beautifully illustrated in an offhand clip of Raphael Rabello at a friend's place playing Tico Tico na Fubá (composed by Zequinha de Abreu in 1917)...

Guitar god, Brazilian style

In 1989 Raphael severely fractured his right arm in an automobile accident and was forced to undergo a number of surgeries. During this period he received blood contaminated with AIDS, which would take his life in 1995. He left behind a number of consummate recordings.

And here's the trailer to Mika Kaurismäki's 2005 choro documentary, Brasileirinho...

The man seated to the right in the photo above is Ernesto Joaquim Maria dos Santos, better known to his friends and to history as Donga. Donga participated in both the composition and performance of the first ever carnival samba recorded (and referred to as such) in Brazil, Pelo Telephone (By Telephone).

Where was Pelo Telephone (nowadays spelled, in keeping with official changes in Portuguese orthography, Pelo Telfone) written? Right! At Tia Ciata's house! It was sung by Bahiano (Manuel Pedro dos Santos), so called because he was from Santo Amaro, Bahia, and it was the big hit of Carnaval 1917. And what was by telephone? Rio's chief of police had (apparently) let it be known to the bicheiros running the jogo de bicho (animal games), a common gambling game (still existent and highly involved in financing Rio's Carnival schools), that they'd be advised by telephone when there was about to be a raid, and this had become common knowledge. The song's original lyrics dealt with this humorously, and were changed in the recorded version.

Listen to Pelo Telephone

Why would such a samba come to be written in Tia Ciata's house? Tia Ciata, whose real name was Hilária Batista de Almeida (Brazilians love nicknames), was born in Santo Amaro, Bahia in 1854. She emigrated to Rio in 1876 at 22 years of age, settling close to Praça Onze, a public square in an area called Cidade Nova (New City), this area aptly nicknamed by one its illustrious residents, sambista and painter Heitor dos Prazeres, as Pequena África (Little Africa).

Heitor dos Prazeres' Roda de Samba

Yaô

Most of the residents of Pequena África were, if not personally, then moving back a generation or two, of Bahian origin (Donga's mother and father, for example, were born in Bahia), and the Bahian movement to Rio was accompanied by their religion (candomblé) and its ceremonies. Now, by this time the dominant strand in this religion had become that of the last ethnic group (broadly speaking) to be taken to Brazil, that of the Yorubans. Did you listen to the Pixinguinha tunes? The second in the sequence, Yaô (sung by João da Baiana, whose mother -- as indicated by his nickname -- was from Bahia) is named for the title given to an initiate into candomblé Ketu, which is the candomblé of the Yorubans. The song is about a festa of female yaôs, including mentions in the lyrics of Ketu orixás (deities) Ogum, Oxalá, Yemanjá, Oxossi, Nanã Buruku, and Xangô. But the drumming, singing and dancing which came after the candomblé ceremonies in both Bahia and Rio -- and by extension in the quintal (backyard, so to speak) of Tia Ciata's house -- was not that of the Yorubans, it was that of the the first ethnic group to be forcibly brought to Brazil, principally to Bahia, the Bantus. And in their candomblé ceremonies, a candomblé referred to as candomblé angola (in obvious reference to the territory of the practitioners' origins), the rhythms were built around what in secular settings would come to be called...that's right!...samba! From this point on samba in Rio de Janeiro was on its own path. It would flower and fluoresce in an urban culture, climb the morros (hills) of Rio along with the poor who had nowhere else to build their barracos (shacks), it would become the music of radio, music written by men of the morros and sung by radio stars who earned vastly more, and it would become the music of a carnival which would eventually become established at Praça Onze and which nowadays parades inside a vast Sambódromo located where Praça Onze once stood, as did the house of Tia Ciata.

João da Baiana. His brothers and sisters were all born in Bahia. He, the youngest, was born in Rio de Janeiro.

Sinhô, the King of Samba (O Rei do Samba)

Before leaving Tia Ciata's house and its enormously influential place in the history of Brazilian music behind, another assiduous participant in the rodas de samba there was José Barbosa da Silva, better known then and now as Sinhô, o Rei do Samba. Before the age of radio stars had really kicked in (due to a number of factors including a change from broadcasting classical music to popular, the introduction of new microphones allowing more nuanced singing, and the wider proliferation of radio receivers), Sinhô and his music were everywhere. This was most definitely samba (Sinhô worked in other, related musical idioms as well), played within samba's metrical structure(s), but to uninitiated listeners it might not sound all that much like samba, being sometimes referred to as samba amaxixado.

Dance, Music, Person?

"Amaxixado" comes from the word maxixe, which referred first to a dance and then to the music played to accompany that dance. Actually, a maxixe is a vegetable common enough in Brazilian kitchens, but how a dance came to be named for a vegetable is a mystery. One version is that the dance's inventor was somebody nicknamed Maxixe; another is that the dance's lowly stature (it was a couples' dance wherein the man stepped well in between the woman's legs) was being metaphorically paired to the fact that maxixes grow along vines on the ground (I doubt this version, at least the first sounds plausible). But whatever the case the music combined elements of lundus and polkas, lundu being a shortening of calundu, calundu being a religious celebration which bequeathed a dance (lundu) in secular settings, which begat a style of music.

Anyway, maxixe was played without percussion instruments, so pretty much any samba played likewise either received the appelation amaxixado, or was simply referred to as maxixe.

The Bambas of Estácio de Sá and the Rise of Modern Samba

A bamba is a sambista, a real sambista, someone who lives samba. According to Nei Lopes' Novo Dicionário Banto do Brasil (New Bantu Dictionary of Brazil) the word is derived from the Kimbundu (a language spoken in the region of Angola) mbamba, signifying a master, an expert (coincidentally, bamba is also a Portuguese word meaning weakly, e.g. pernas bambas would be wobbly legs, like those of a crazy-legged sambista). And it was the bambas of Rio's Pequena África neighborhood Estácio de Sá who took the samba of the day and worked it into something carioca through and through (carioca = somebody from Rio).

Ismael Silva, bamba

"What happened was something new in the rhythm, a modification of what was in the lundus, the polkas, the maxixe, the batuque. It was a difficult situation. The coffee plantations, the wars for the Republic spilled people into the city, there wasn't enough room for everybody. The thing was to climb the hills. The region where samba was born was poorer, more abandoned than you see here today. Samba represents, carries this mark since its origins. For us to gain space, conquer radio, was never easy -- they stole our songs, we were obligated to sell them, and we sold them."

Pelo Telefone had been a big Carnival hit, a great song for multitudes of people to sing in unison. But Ismael didn't feel that the style was truly conducive to what people do during Carnival, which, first among other things, is march. And he absolutely wanted the percussion back in (as far as he was concerned Pelo Telefone wasn't even samba at all!). So he and his friends took the samba of the day and opened it up, going as far as allowing syncopation (per African percussion) to overflow the bounderies of the measure. When they were finished, what they'd created wasn't just samba to be sung, to dance to; it was samba to parade to.

Ismael and his group of friends (which included Tia Ciata's grandson Bucy Moreira) not only created a new rhythmic structure for samba, they created -- in 1928 -- the first samba school, Deixa Falar (Let 'em Talk). This isn't to say that they created the first group to go out and march during Carnival, this had been going on for decades. But they went out with heavier percussion (at this point in time the only Carnival percussion was pandeiros, Brazilian tambourines, which had been introduced into a type of Carnival group called a rancho by the aforementioned João da Baiana). And inspired by their proximity to a nearby escola normal (high school), they elevated their group to a "school" as well. They were professores de samba!

In the clip below, filmed for Brazilian television in 1977 -- one year before Ismael Silva died -- he speaks of his adaptation of the samba of the time, and of his origin of the term "samba school". His composition Nem é Bom Falar is sung by Roberto Ribeiro.

Two other members of Deixa Falar and writing partners were Alcebíades Barcelos, better known to his friends and to the world as Bide, and Armando Vieira Marçal, known likewise simply as Marçal.

Bide, bamba

Marçal, bamba

Bide invented an instrument commonly used in samba now, the surdo (a big bass drum; "surdo" means "deaf"), making the first one from a large can which began life as a container for butter, and the sambas in Marçal's house included Francisco Alves and Orlando Silva, two golden-throated singers of Brazil's golden age of radio.

Orlando Silva, a voice like warm liquid opium

Listen to Orlando Silva sing Pixinguinha's Carinhoso
(the extended orchestral introduction has been cut)

(The Divine) Cartola

Lived in by simple people, and so poor
That only the sun covers them all
How can you, Mangueira, sing?

Habitado por gente simples e tão pobre
Que só tem o sol que a todos cobre
Como podes, Mangueira, cantar?

-- Cartola, Sala de Espera

Nelson Sargento, of Mangueira

Q: Why is Nelson Sargento sitting before a pink and green flag?

A: Pink and green are the colors of the Mangueira samba school, colors chosen by Cartola. Cartola suffered repeated criticism that the colors didn't go together well, that they clashed, and he would answer thusly: "Pink is for love, and green is for hope, and how is it that love and hope do not go together well?" A more obvious answer would have been that nobody ever complained about pink mangos hanging amongst the greenery of the mangueiras (mango trees) on the hill where Mangueira was located, but then Cartola was never an obvious person.

Cartola, a man (nick)named for a hat, is considered by many to be the apotheosis of samba. In 1949 the new president of the Mangueira samba school chose a professor of music to choose Mangueira's samba enredo (Carnival samba) for that year.

Nelson Sargento comments: "O professor escolheu o meu samba. Mas ele explicou: pela beleza, pela perfeição, por tudo, ele daria 10 para o do Cartola, e 6 para o meu. Agora, para o desfile, o meu era mais fácil, era melhor. O do Cartola, em terrmos de hoje (1949), não era comercial. ... A música dele era muito elaborada, a linha melódica muito difícil."

"The professor chose my samba. But he explained that for beauty, for perfection, for everything, he'd give a 10 to Cartola's composition and a 6 to mine. But for the parade, mine was easier, it was better. Cartola's, in today's terms (1949), wasn't commercial. ... His music was elaborate, the melody line difficult."

But let's back up for a moment, to the other golden-age-of-radio singer who frequented Marçal's house, Francisco Alves. Sr. Alves was stopped in the street one day by two penniless young men and asked for money. He responded that he would honor their request if they would each compose a samba for him, right there and then, on the spot. So right there and then he received from one of the young men Qual Foi o Mal que Eu Te Fiz? (How Did I Wrong You?), which he recorded in 1932. From the other he received Estamos Esperando (We're Waiting), which he recorded, together with Mario Reis, also in 1932.

As one might guess, these weren't just any two penniless bums, they happened to be two empty-pocketed young geniuses, Cartola and his buddy Noel Rosa.

Francisco Alves, aka Chico Viola, son of a bar owner, was first taken to record by Sinhô, recording three of Sinhô's compositions for the Carnival of 1920. Quintessential early twentieth century radio singer, he recorded more 78s than any other singer in the history of Brazil. He also bought his way into writing credit with a lot of the men from the morros.

Street Fightin' Madam

Estamos Esperando (for the money?) was Noel's composition. One of Noel Rosa's as-of-yet-unwritten compositions was Mulato Bamba, treating a tough guy in Lapa (a rough neighborhood in Rio with plenty of nightlife) who somehow didn't like the girls and spent a lot of time in salons having his hair dyed. This song was written with Lapa's toughest thug in mind, a brilliant capoeirista and street fighter who also happened to be a flamboyant drag queen called Madame Satã (Madam Satan). Madame Satã would one day kill Geraldo Pereira, another Lapa tough guy, in a bar fight over whose beer was whose, and one of Geraldo Pereira's many compositions would even later become a standard for the guy who invented bossa nova, João Gilberto. I'm way ahead of myself, but whatever the case here's João Gilberto singing Geraldo Pereira's Falsa Baiana...

Listen to Falsa Baiana

Noel Rosa was a fragile young man made more fragile by his inability to eat solid food, result of a botched wrenching by forceps during a difficult birth, breaking his jaw before he'd even parted with his mother's womb (coincidentally and somewhat amazingly, the physician attending Noel's birth would -- sixteen years later -- attend the birth of another future legend, Antonio Carlos Jobim; the doctor who wielded the infamous forceps however was a colleague who'd been called in to assist). Noel was operated on twice as a child and his mother was told that his condition would improve with time, but it only worsened, imprinting upon the young man (dead at 27) an unlikely and unmistakable profile beloved by the masses of his time and generations of samba afficionados thereafter.

Noel Rosa, bamba

The two thin young men (Noel Rosa and Cartola) had diametrically opposing philosophies to serving the masses: Cartola wrote without interest in hearing people whistle his tunes on the street, while Noel craved to stroll into Rio's botecos (bars) hearing his songs being sung by noisy crowds of patrons. And Cartola's philosophy be damned, he got people to whistling anyway, registering songs recorded by all the major singers of the day. Noel's populist approach rendered likewise, while nevertheless placing him in the pantheon of Brazil's all-time finest and most respected songsmiths.

Listen to Noel Rosa's Com Que Roupa?

Com Que Roupa? ("With What Clothes?", per the link above) was THE smash hit of Carnival 1931 (albeit not in this particular version), its inspiration coming when Noel's mother, not wanting her son to risk his health by going out to a samba with his friends, hid his clothes. His galera (group of friends) arrived, calling up for him to come out, only to see Noel lean out the window and reply "With what clothes?" (history doesn't record whether he ever eventually got to the samba or not). With what clothes? become the catch-phrase of the hour in the mouths of a people deeply devoted to sociability while at the same time deeply mired in poverty.

Let me pause here...I'm also working on another music-related project, the Euterpédia. Euterpédia is intended to be a network/nexus/clearinghouse for Brazilian music in the manner of the big, well-known networks, although of course revolving around Brazilian musicians and their music.

So, pertinent to the story here would be Juliana Ribeiro's rendering of the first song ever recorded in Brazil, a lundu (an African-derived Brazilian style of music) entitled Isto é Bom (This is Good), composed by Xisto Bahia of Salvador, Bahia, and first recorded by Bahiano (Manoel Pedro dos Santos) of Santo Amaro, Bahia, in 1902.

Juliana Ribeiro sings Isto é Bom

Ribeiro is a common name in Brazil, and as far as I know there's no family relationship between Juliana above and Roberto below (I'll have to ask Juliana!). Whatever the case, Roberto Ribeiro is the singer in the Ismael Silva clip several paragraphs above (having to do with the creation of samba carioca), and his memory is rapidly falling along the wayside (he lost most of his vision and was killed at forty-five years of age trying to cross the street in Rio in 1996). He was a sambista, a bamba, of impeccable taste, who recorded in the true style of the botecos, streets and public squares, without (with rare exceptions) the dolled-up arrangements so often foisted upon artists by record companies seeking to make their recordings more commercial.

Roberto was the real deal (amazing resemblance to Sam Cooke, isn't it?).

Sam Cooke, Soul Stirrer

With the '30s Brazil entered the radio age in earnest, broadcasting moving from erudite music to popular, and at this point there was a fork in the road: The songs were written drawing upon a vast heritage of forms and rhythms played and sung and danced to wherever people gathered for pretty much anything other than church, the botecos (bars), the quadros (yards) of the samba schools, the quintals (backyards). But they were sung by golden-throats in an evolving style closely matching what was popular in the United States at the time, and for this the aural record is written almost exclusively in these beautiful "radio" voices.