Bailes De Soul, Maria Fumaça And The Black Rio Movement In 70s Brazil
The black community of Rio’s disadvantaged neighborhoods developed a funk & dance scene that challenged racism and the military dictatorship - Its most iconic album is quintessential in groove music worldwide
In the Rio de Janeiro of the early 70s, the Afrobrazilian youth didn’t really have a scene. It’s true, their forefathers had invented Samba, out of which Bossa Nova was born a decade or so before; but that was something for old people or artsy intellectuals, and not really fun to dance to anyway. The new generations were instead fascinated by the cultural byproducts of the Afro American experience: screenings of blaxploitation movies with Afro American protagonists like Shaft were extremely popular. The audience knew the films by heart, and Isaac Hayes, who composed the soundtrack, was considered an icon. Soul and funk music especially were extremely popular among black and mixed audiences. Some, inspired by this craze, began to organize dance parties in the poor neighborhoods of north Rio de Janeiro, where they would play imported American funk records: classics like James Brown, The Jackson 5 and Sly and the Family Stone, lesser-known gems like The Blackbyrds or Marva Whitney and so on.
The groups had high-sounding names like Black Power and Soul Grand Prix. They were rivals, but sometimes cooperated for special, crossover-like events. They called the parties “Bailes de soul”. Soon the most popular baile crews were able to attract ten, fifteen thousand people to any single event.
The audiences were composed almost entirely of young boys and girls of African descent, who often lived in the favelas of the city. They saw the looks of the musicians on the album covers and wanted to imitate them: they wore afros, hip sunglasses and sleek sneakers. But the bailes were not just about looking cool: in the intention of the organizers, they also had a political goal. The music and the blaxploitation flicks projected on walls during the parties showed black people in a position of power and were a constant example of self-affirmation. “Dom” Filó Filho, Soul Grand Prix’s founder and master of ceremonies, was known for delivering speeches about overcoming the adverse economic situation through self-esteem, studying, personal growth, and dedication.
“These parties were an opportunity to glimpse ways to deconstruct the systemic racism in Brazilian society, at least on a personal level, and triumph over it”
Revolutionary concepts for a society that did not consider itself racist. Instead, it was very common among Brazilians the idea that, because the population had been very mixed for such a long time, the country was a “racial democracy” basically exempt from discrimination, in which it was useless at best or dangerous at worst to analyze race relations. In truth racism in Brazil was systemic (and still is). These parties were an opportunity to glimpse ways to deconstruct the system, at least on a personal level, and triumph over it.
On the left, Asfilófio de Oliveira, a.k.a. Dom Filó Filho, in 1972 at the Clube Renascença.
They used a word that wanted to summarize these attitudes, stylish but also conscious: they called themselves Blacks. Not just pretos, which is the Portuguese word for the colour black. They used the English word instead. So when the newspapers took notice and started to write about the movement, they invented for them the name “Black Rio”, perhaps to mock their love for everything Afro American. Instead, the new name unified the different crews under one name, the “Movimento Black”.
Indeed they needed unity because the increased publicity brought consequences and criticism. Some, still believing Brazil to be a racial democracy, were afraid that these parties, whose target audience were black and mixed people, would reinforce a racial division in the country. They thought that Black Rio was discriminatory towards non-blacks, although no one had complained whenever white folks had organized much bigger, white-oriented rock music concerts in the richer neighborhoods of south Rio. The left-leaning intelligentsia dismissed the scene as a textbook manifestation of US imperialism. But the most dangerous reaction came from the government. Since 1964 (and until 1985), Brazil had been ruled over by a military regime that had basically suspended constitutional guarantees, allowing for the usage of censorship, arrest and torture of anyone who was considered an opponent. Many incredible Brazilian musicians such as Gilberto Gil and Chico Buarque were forced into exile or worse for a few years during this time because they were too outspoken.
“they needed unity because the increased publicity brought consequences and criticism”
The government started to fear that the bailes could be a cover-up for the activities of a movement similar to the Black Panthers; they sent plain-clothes cops to spy on the parties and raided the events without warning, looking for suspects. Filó was taken into police custody one night to investigate “subversive activities” under the suspicion of promoting “racial hate”, and suffered psychological torture. He bluffed: “If I don’t go back home tonight, 15.000 Blacks will storm this building tomorrow”. The police chose to play it safe and released him, but one thing was clear: the Blacks were dangerous and their music a potential threat.
And nonetheless, the movement had never been more popular. In 1976 they had enough money to invite real-deal performing bands from the States for small tours. Record labels became interested and cooperated with baile organizers to issue compilations of soul hits. But the scene was finally mature enough to allow for the birth of local bands. One of the first musicians to achieve this vision was saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Oberdan Magalhães. He had worked with Dom Filó on Soul Grand Prix’s LPs and had already had an extensive career as a session man playing groove-tinged music. It was time to go all out.
There they are. Oberdan is the one in the middle holding a cigarette.
He gained the confidence of Warner Records and assembled a group of skilled instrumentalists. No vocalists: pure groove to dance to, no distractions. No lyrics were needed to deliver their message, after all the name they chose for themselves was enough: Banda Black Rio.
In 1977 their first album Maria Fumaça came out, and it was a blast. It’s a relentless tour-de-force of funk rhythms that sets the record straight: it makes no compromise with simplicity. Think James Brown’s Bodyheat level of groove tightness. But it also shuts up the whiners that would have preferred for a black band to be true to their samba roots, not so involved with foreign genres: the BBR bounce from original compositions to new versions of old samba and baião classics like it’s nothing, weaving in seamlessly carnival rhythms, bossa melodic overtones and the sudden appearance of squeaking cuíca drums (have you ever wondered what that monkey-like sounding instrument was? Now you know).
“Banda Black Rio weave in seamlessly carnival rhythms, bossa melodic overtones and the sudden appearance of tropical samba percussions”
Add in some jazz conscience in solo phrasing and the trustworthy leadership of Magalhães and you get a gem of funk fusion, that contributed to codify the new genre of Samba Funk. BBR were not the first to mix funky grooves and Brazilian music, but it’s with the Black Rio movement that the blend became self-aware, became a scene, a genre.
In the following years, the Banda Black Rio published two more LPs, Gafieira Universal in 1978 and Saci Pererê in 1980, evolving their sound with disco breaks and maintaining their trademark interplay between the classy and the gritty, the Brazilian and the American. They even added a few vocalists in some songs to make explicit their social message. In between their own records they toured and recorded with other Brazilian artists that understood the potential in the Black Rio scene, such as Caetano Veloso and Brazilian soul legend Tim Maia, and appeared in a few soundtracks for movies and tv series.
Sossego went on to be one of Tim’s most recognizable songs in Brazil.
Around Banda Black Rio, a new slew of artists was moving their first steps in Brazilian music with their own interpretation of the same ideal that inspired the Baile de soul crews and Oberdan Magalhães, such as Banda União Black (totally worth checking out!). Seasoned musicians like Gilberto Gil and Jorge Ben were influenced by the public discourse about black pride and released albums influenced by Pan-African musical genres: look up Refavela by the first and África Brasil by the second. It was a revolution in music and a moment of realisation for Afrobrazilians, in Rio and in other cities of the country.
Unfortunately, Oberdan did not see its evolution as he died in 1984 in a car accident. The band stopped, the bailes in the favelas went on. The scene changed as the society around it did, and so did the music: it incorporated disco, then hip hop/electro, then Miami bass and so on, becoming something completely different. The original name kinda stuck though: it’s no coincidence that today the favela urban music is called Baile Funk.
Words by Alessandro Cebrian Cobos
