African Influences On The Music of Brazil

African Influences on the Music of Brazil
Author(s): David E. Vassberg

Source: Luso-Brazilian Review, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Summer, 1976), pp. 35-54
Published by: University of Wisconsin Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3512714
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African Influenceson the Music
of Brazil
David E.Vassberg
In Brazil, as in the United States, in Cuba, and in other

American nations where the Negro is present in force, the children
of Africa have had a profound effect on the culture of the nation.
This has been nowhere more noticeable than in music. Some of the
world's richest and most fascinating music has been produced in
Brazil. The present study 1 will deal with some of the character-
istics of Brazilian music, with special emphasis on the ethnic in-
fluences which have shaped it. One of the most prominent influ-
ences in Brazil is the African element. A glance at Brazil's
racial cross section gives an indication of why this is true. The
present population of the nation is estimated to be about eleven
percent pure black and over twenty-six percent mulatto. Thus, well
over a third of all Brazilians have African ancestors. And during
Brazil's formative colonial period, African slaves and their off-
spring usually outnumbered whites. Compared to the United States,
Brazil not only has a far greater proportion of blacks, but the
connection with Africa was also both longer and more recent.2 It
is hardly surprising, then, that the African element in Brazilian
culture is so strong.
In order to properly assess the extent of Negro musical influ-

ence in Brazil, it is necessary first to examine Negro music in the
African context. But this presents the musical historian with a
perplexing problem. For the interest of musicologists in black
Africa postdates by far the era during which slaves were brought to
the Americas. And in the interim, African music has lost its
purity; it has become contaminated by European characteristics as
Africans experienced more and more contact with whites.3
Nevertheless, we can make certain general judgments concerning
the musical heritage the black slaves brought to Brazil. In the
first place, in primitive Africa, as in almost all nonliterate so-
cieties, musical activity had an integral function in society.
Music and the other arts were not compartmentalized and divorced
from the aspects of everyday life as they are in Western society.
The performance of music was not relegated to a few professionals
who performed for the masses; but rather was a function of rela-
tively large numbers of the members of society. And their music
was used in far more settings than in Western society. Not all
African societies were alike, but a common denominator was the use
of music as an integral part of their life style. Music played a
role in all important events from birth to death. There was music
35
36 Luso-Brazilian Review
for: nursing babies, educating the young, initiations into tribal

life, weddings, agricultural festivals, religious rites, war, love,
relaxation, courtroom proceedings, protest, hero-worship, execu-
tions-virtually everything was done to a musical setting. Some
music was traditional and explicitly functional; some was more
spontaneous.4
From their earliest contacts with black music, white Europeans

were fascinated by it. This was particularly true of the Portu-
guese, as they pushed down the west coast of Africa during the
1400's in search of a sea route to India. Many Negro dancers and
musicians were brought to Portugal for the entertainment value of
their exotic music.5
Some European observers have insisted that black Africans pos-
sess an extraordinary talent for music. The German musicologist
Eric Maria von Hornbostel concluded that the African Negroes were
"uncommonly gifted for music-probably, on an average, more so than
the white race."6 Other whites have found that the black race
is "essentially musical," and that music is "the glory of Negro
art."7 There has been the intriguing suggestion that the West
African languages, which have a musicosemantic structure (with
pitch levels affecting word meanings) have influenced the musical
abilities of the people.8 But not all Europeans have been in
agreement about the musical talents of African blacks. The Dutch-
man William Bosman, who visited the Gold Coast of Guinea in the
late 1600's, dismissed the music as a "dismal and horrid Noise,"
and "Asses Musick." His opinion was sustained by the early nine-
teenth-century English explorers Richard and John Lander.9 But
these unfavorable judgments were by nonspecialists who were suf-
fering from the bias of an intolerant ethnocentrism.
One must attempt to come to a dispassionate judgment about the
alleged musical nature of the Negro. Many authors have believed
black Africans to possess a total and generalized capacity for
music. But this view is distorted; it reflects a lack of under-
standing of the place of music in primitive African society. While
it is true that there was a high ratio of participation in musical
activity, some individuals were more talented than others, and
acted as leaders, often in a strict hierarchical system based on
musical abilities.10 Nevertheless, in a society in which music
was regularly performed by a large segment of the population, the
discovery and development of natural talents would be facilitated.
As a result, a larger number of naturally gifted individuals would
become actively involved in music than in the compartmentalized
society of modern Euro-America. This would cause the impression
that the Negro was more talented than the white. In conclusion,
perhaps it could be said that blacks (whether in Africa or in
America) are more musical than whites, but the basis for this dif-
ference is cultural rather than genetic.
Black Africa is by no means a homogeneous musical unit. Just
as it is impossible to speak of a single "African" language or
culture, it is also impossible to speak of "an" African music.
There are many musical areas in Sub-Saharan Africa, each with its
David E. Vassberg 37
own characteristics, subdivisions, and variations. Generally, it

can be said that the northern part of black Africa is characterized
by Islamic influences, and the West Coast is differentiated from
the East Coast by its stronger emphasis on percussion instruments
and the use of "hot" rhythm. The musical cultures of black Africa
vary in sophistication, but none can be said to be primitive.11
A feature common to the music of all black Africa is its inti-
mate and quasi-subsidiary relationship with dance. In fact, it
would be superficial to speak of one without taking the other into
consideration, because for blacks there is a symbiotic relation-
ship between music and dance. This, for Europeans, has always
been one of the most intriguing features of Negro music. As the
French ethnohistorian Raymond Mauny put it, blacks for milleniums
have been the hommes de Za danse.12 It was intrinsically linked
to the socio-religious-magical rites of the tribe. Historically,
man has always linked music with magic, the supernatural, and the
gods. Music was first used by primitive man to enchant-to commu-
nicate with the deities. The Orpheus legend symbolized the origi-
nal function of music in the human psyche. It is no accident that
the Latin root of "enchant" means "to sing." The music-dance cere-
monies of Africa were religious rites designed to influence the
supernatural.13
But the African music-dance was used not only to please the
deities, but also to help man enter into contact with them. Music
and dance established the proper psychophysical conditions neces-
sary for this. The repetitive figures of the ritual music-dance
produced a hypnotic state, in which the performer was conscious
of being possessed (or inspired). This gave the music-dance a
superhuman quality-it was not just an art, but a holy thing. Many
primitive cultures the world over have myths that music was god-
created.14
Virtually all observers agree that the most salient feature of
black African music is its rhythm, which is far more prominent than
either melody or harmony. This rhythmic preponderance is linked to
the close relationship between music and dance. There are a number
of theories of African rhythm,15 with most authorities stressing
the physical articulation of the beat, whether by body movement or
through percussive accompaniment.16 But the ethnomusicologist
Richard Waterman has insisted that the articulation of the beat may
be purely mental. Waterman hypothesizes that Africans have a
"metronome sense," which consists of conceiving music around a
theoretical framework of regularly spaced beats expressed either in
overt motor behavior or mentally. Most whites have not developed
this "metronome sense," consequently, they find African rhythms
incomprehensible. 17
Black African rhythm is extremely complex, often employing two
or more meters simultaneously-combinations of duple and triple
times, for instance. This rhythmic heterophony, polymeter, or mul-
tiple meter sounds completely puzzling to Europeans, who are un-
prepared for its complexity, and usually are unable to disentangle
the component parts. 8 A question much debated among musicologists
is whether syncopation (accenting the up-beat, or off-beat) is
38 Luso-BraziZian Review
native to Africa. There is no definitive answer, as yet. Some

scholars insist that syncopation, while not uniquely African (many
musical cultures possessed it), is a basic characteristic of na-
tive African music.19 Other musicologists disagree. Rose Brandel
and Fred and Lee Warren conclude that the music of Africa is not
syncopated, though it appears syncopated to some Europeans who mis-
interpret the overall effect of the combination of several unsyn-
copated meters into a complex polyrhythmic whole.20 A somewhat
different twist is taken by Hornbostel, who allows that African
music sounds syncopated to Europeans, but who insists that it is
not syncopated to the African, whose concept of rhythm is based
not on auditory, but on muscular impulses. Hornbostel believes
that to the African, the beat coincides with the act of raising
the hand above the drum, rather than with the striking of the drum-
head. For Africans, in other words, the off-beat is the beat.21
But this hypothesis has been convincingly rejected by Mieczyslaw
Kolinski.22
African music is also characterized by the widespread use of
antiphony (the call and response pattern, usually alternated by a
soloist and a chorus) and by improvisation (the extemporaneous or
spontaneous development of new themes).23
It has already been emphasized that in some respects, particu-
larly in the rhythmic element, European and African music were
very different. But in other respects, there was a remarkable
similarity between the two musical cultures. In the use of har-
mony, the reliance on the diatonic scale, fundamental metric bases,
and certain basic forms, Europe and Africa comprised a relatively
homogeneous area. The basic similarity of the two musical cultures
was long obscured for a number of reasons, among which were: a
culture bias of early musicologists; the fact that a broad band of
Arabic and Arabic-inspired music stretched across Northern Africa,
separating the two with an alien culture; and the fact that Euro-
pean music had evolved in harmony to a point of complexity where
it seemed completely unrelated to the music of tribal Africa.24
The basic similarity of African and European music facili-
tated, and almost guaranteed, that the two would blend in the New
World to create a new synthesized music. This underlying musical
homogeneity permitted many aspects of African musical style and
values to survive in America because they did not deviate too far
from the accepted norms of white society. The similarity between
European folk music and African tribal music was particularly
striking, the main difference being that the former was more com-
plex harmonically, whereas the latter was more complex rhythmi-
cally.25
The African slaves in Brazil heard little in European folk
music that was incompatible with their own native music. The
slaves and their descendants often used European folk tunes to
create new songs-a hybrid or syncretized music. The successful
blending of African and European music was easier in Brazil than
in Anglo America because the music of both Portugal and Africa had
been influenced by Arabic elements, particularly in instrumentation
and in rhythm.26 It should be emphasized that the syncretized
music which was the product of this blending in Brazil was not the
result of mere imitation of European styles-though initially there
must have been some conscious and unconscious imitation-but was a
transfiguration of both styles to create a truly new music, with
new rhythmic, harmonic, and choreographic combinations. This music
was no longer either African or European-it was Negro Brazilian,
and came to constitute the music folklore of a large part of the
population.27
The African impact on Brazilian music was infinitely greater
than the American Indian's impact, for several reasons. In the
first place, except during the sixteenth century, blacks far out-
numbered Indians. Secondly, the music of Africa was far stronger
and more developed than was that of the aboriginal Americans. And
finally, whereas the musical cultures of Africa and Europe were
similar enough to permit easy syncretization, Amerindian music was
so alien that it could not fit into the basic Afro-European mold.
As a result, examples of genuine syncretization between European
and American Indian music have been rare.28
Most slaves imported to Brazil went to a zone along the coast,
roughly from the tip of Brazil's "hump" to the Tropic of Capricorn.
Minas Gerais, in the interior, also received a large infusion of
slaves after the discovery of gold and diamonds. The centers of
Negro influence, corresponding to the economic and political cen-
ters of Brazil, were Pernambuco, Bahia, and Rio de Janeiro. Blacks
from a number of African tribes were brought to Brazil, but most
were from the west coast region-the area facing Brazil on the
opposite side of the Atlantic. Among them were Bantu from Angola
and the Congo, Yoruba from Nigeria and Dahomey, Ashanti from Ghana,
and Muslim slaves such as the Hausa.29 Slaves were drawn from all
levels of African society, including the highest, for prosperous
freemen and even royalty occasionally became enslaved as the re-
sult of wars or ambush. These upperclass slaves added to the im-
portance of the African contribution to Brazil.30
In Brazil as in Africa, music continued to play an important
part in the lives of these peoples. The role of music in the life
of the slave was semicontradictory. In one sense, it was an agent
of accultration. Since the European music and above all the syn-
cretized Afro-Brazilian music he heard contained familiar elements,
it eased the burden of adjusting to a new and harsh life style.
In Brazil as in Africa, music was an integral part of daily life,
and the medium of music acted to harmonize antagonisms. Music func-
tioned as a socio-psychological safety valve. For the slave, it
provided an emotional release from an essentially hostile surround-
ing culture. But music also acted as a powerful cohesive element,
linking the slaves to their old African traditions, and contribut-
ing to the continuity and stability of certain African values.31
In Brazil, as in Africa, music played an essential part in the
religious expression of the black. The music of the enslaved Afri-
cans remained in its purest African tradition in the religious cult
ceremonies of Bahia and other places where there were large concen-
trations of blacks. The Afro-Brazilian cults usually represented
some form of accommodation between the Roman Catholic and the
African religions. But the music-even as late as the mid-

twentieth century-retained a measure of purity which astounds the
student. Not only the instruments, rhythm, melody, polyphony,
timbre, and choreography are African, but often the language is
African as well. The purity of the African element in Afro-
Brazilian cults varies greatly from place to place. But the cults
remain even today-and certainly functioned with much greater in-
fluence before-as proof of the strength and durability of the
African heritage. The cults are called macumba in Rio de Janeiro,
candomblZ in Bahia, pagelanqa in the Amazon region, and catimb6 in
the northeast. The purest of these are the candomble ceremonies
of Bahia, which is the most African of Brazilian cities. The can-
domble music there retained its original spirit because it evolved
in circles closed to noncultists, and therefore relatively exempt
from stylization and commercialization.32
In addition to their cult music, black slaves and their de-
scendants maintained other elements of their African musical heri-
tage. One of the most important, prominent in all forms of Afro-
Brazilian music, was the use of African and African-influenced
instruments. In Africa, consistent with (and perhaps determined
by) the unequaled rhythmic sophistication, there was a rich varie-
ty of percussive instruments such as drums, rattles, bells, and
gongs. There were also wind and stringed instruments, but these
tended to be overwhelmed by the strength and vigor of the percus-
sive element.33
Some African instruments appear to have been brought by slaves
to Brazil, but this must have been rare. However, the blacks in
Brazil did possess the basic natural instrument-the human body,
which could produce melody through singing and whistling, and per-
cussive rhythmic effects through hand clapping, foot stamping,
etc. But the transplanted Africans also constructed instruments
in Brazil. Some treasured African instruments disappeared, because
they could not be produced with Brazilian materials. The ivory
trumpets of the Guinean cultures, for instance, could not be made
without elephant tusks. Other instruments had to be modified,
since the materials at hand were different. And later, after the
slave trade was abolished and the number of native-born Africans
declined, there was an increasing tendency to modify the original
African instruments. Nevertheless, many remained strikingly similar
to their African ancestors.34
The basis of Negro music, and the principal medium of black
musical expression, is the drum. The variety of drums is almost
unlimited in size and materials. The Brazilian atabaques (conical
drums with a single head at the wide end, almost invariably used
in sets of three) had two African origins: Sudanes and Bantu.
They were used originally, and are still, in Afro-Brazilian reli-
gious ceremonies.35 Cult drums are "baptised" to give them super-
natural powers, and are periodically "fed" with offerings of blood,
honey, and holy water to maintain their power. These ceremonies
emphasize the mystical or spiritual qualities of the drum.36 The
Englishman Robert Walsh, who traveled in Brazil in 1828-29,
called the atabaque a "spirit-stirring drum" which had a powerful
"electric" effect on all the Negroes within the extent of its con-
siderable hearing distance.37
In Brazil as in Africa, the drum was used not only for musical
expression, but also to transmit messages. The Yoruba bat~-cotO
(war drum) played a large role in slave insurrections in Brazil.
The sound of this drum produced such a stirring effect on normally
docile slaves that after a serious revolt in 1835, the further im-
portation of the batc-cotO was prohibited.38
One of the most common of the Brazilian drums of African ori-
gin, among literally scores of others too numerous to mention is
the putta or cuica, a friction drum which produces a strange lugu-
brious grunting sound. In addition to drums, Afro-Brazilian in-
struments included a rich variety of other percussive instruments,
many almost identical to their old world forebears. Prominent
among these were the agog&, a bi-tonal iron bell; the piano de
cuia, a gourd rattle covered with a net of imported African cow-
ries; and the xaque-xaque, a dumbbell-shaped metal rattle. Black
slaves in Brazil also fabricated several types of African stringed
instruments, but except for the berimbau or urucungo, a one-
stringed musical bow, they were abandoned in favor of the greater
musical possibilities of the Spanish guitar and its Brazilian varia-
tions. The marimba, also of African origin, was extremely popular
among slaves, but by the mid-twentieth century, it had become vir-
tually extinct in Brazil.39
African slaves not only introduced their native instruments in-
to Brazil; they also introduced their playing style and their atti-
tudes toward music and musicians. An interesting African survival
in Brazil which is common to all Negro cultures is a virtual male
monopoly on drumming. There is a taboo-seldom broken-against a
woman playing a drum. Also of African origin is the feeling of
group unity among Brazilian drummers, and the immense prestige ac-
corded a good drummer by the community.40
The enslaved Africans never interrupted their musical life. In
1821 Maria Graham reported that she heard Negroes singing as they
debarked from their slave ships in Bahia. She did not find the
songs sad, but to be sure they were hymns of lament rather than of
joy.41 The white masters discovered that, whether aboard slave
ship or on plantation, blacks who were stimulated by music tended
to be more tractable and more productive. Hence, the captives were
given the privilege of continuing their native African music. Song
always accompanied the slaves during their work. From ancient
times, it had been an African42 custom to sing while working, es-
pecially while performing manual work requiring regular rhythmic
movements. At first, these work songs followed the original Afri-
can forms, but most gradually acquired a degree of Europeanization,
particularly in melody and words.43
European visitors to Brazil during the slave days were enchanted
by the black work songs. The English merchant John Luccock wrote
that the black porters of Rio sang African work songs in 1808.
Twenty years later, Robert Walsh reported that the black work songs
were heard "everyday, and in almost every street of Rio" but that
the Negroes could not, or would not, translate the meaning of the
words they sang. Possibly they were Brazilian-born, and had

learned the songs from their African-born fellows without under-
standing the words. But the work songs did not die out, even if
the singers did not understand the meaning. In the 1850's the
missionaries Kidder and Fletcher were astounded to see gangs of
muscular slaves literally running through the streets of Rio while
balancing 160-pound bags of coffee on their heads and singing "some
Ethiopian ditty" to mark the pace. Carrying loads on the head
(also African) was the usual means of transport for slaves in
Brazil. That method had the advantage of leaving at least one
hand free, which often held a gourd rattle or small marimba to
play along with the work and song. In 1858, the French painter
Francois-Auguste Biard witnessed an entire household of furniture,
including a grand piano, being moved by Negro porters in that
fashion. In these work groups, there was generally a leader who
coordinated the singing with the work and who sang solo to the
alternating chorus of the others in the group.44 Each type of
work had its special songs. There were songs of harvest, of row-
ing, of cattle driving, of digging, of advertising merchandise-
there were even songs for beggars.45 The slaves of the gold and
diamond fields of eighteenth-century Minas Gerais had special work
songs called vissungos for every phase of the mining operation.
The colonial authorities tried to isolate mining areas from outside
contacts, to eliminate smuggling and tax-evasion. As a result,
some pockets of African culture remained relatively pure through
the centuries. As late as the 1940's, blacks in one remote mining
village continued to sing vissungos in a Bantu dialect, though few
of the singers could understand the words. Slaves in the mining
camps worked singing all the day long. And after abolition, some
Negroes refused to work for masters who tried to prohibit the vis-
sungos. Unfortunately, these Afro-Brazilian work songs are now
disppaearing as communications and mass-media music are extended
to previously isolated parts of Brazil.46
The life of the slaves did not consist solely of work. Slaves
were normally given free time on Sundays and holidays, and they
availed themselves of the opportunity to maintain their African
heritage of music and dance. Foreign travelers in Brazil reported
that the slaves held dances regularly, whenever and wherever a
group of them assembled. On weekends, the dance often lasted the
night through until dawn the next morning.47 Most foreigners in-
correctly assumed that these dances were mere diversions, but they
were grounded in the traditional African socio-religious matrix.
As has already been observed, the Afro-Brazilian music-dance for
the candomble and other cults was distinctly religious.
There were also dramatic dance forms of African origin. The
bumba-meu-boi, most prevalent in Brazil's pastoral northeast, was
a drama glorifying the ox, acted out in costume with music and
dance. Other dramatic dances were the congos or congadas, which
had various forms, but originated as a coronation ceremony honor-
ing the King of the Congo. In Brazil, a "king" was chosen among
the slaves for a festival featuring "African" costumes. A third
type of Afro-Brazilian dramatic dance was the capoeira, which
originated in Angola as a form of personal combat, and was intro-

duced into Brazil in the sixteenth century. It was used by run-
away slaves, who had nothing but their agility and physical force
to help them avoid recapture. It later became stylized as a dance-
sport featuring two antagonists who used what could be described
as a sort of Afro-Brazilian karate. There were numerous other
dramatic dance forms, each with its own traditional music and in-
strumentation, for funerals, harvests, hunting, and various other
celebrations. Many of these are still performed in Brazil.48
Some of the music-dance forms which in Africa had had other
functions evolved in Brazil into mere diversionary activities.
But Afro-Brazilians participated in these recreational dances with
a near-religious passion and intensity, which can possibly best be
explained by their original religious function. Robert Walsh
wrote in 1828-29 that at the first strokes of the drums, Brazilian
blacks would "rush to the spot from all quarters, and in a little
time they [were] worked up to a degree of hilarity little short
of frenzy."49
The original recreational dance of the slaves was the batuque,
an import from the Congo and Angola, which in Brazil evolved into
the primitive samba. In both, the participants formed a circle,
out of which one couple would move to the center to perform until
fatigued, when they would be replaced by another couple. An es-
sential feature of both dances was the umbigada-a navel-to-navel
bump (either real or stylized) which is a characteristic of African
choreography. The Bantu name for this gesture was semba, from
which the word "samba" was derived. Because it originated as a
slave dance, the samba was disdained by Brazilian whites and upper
classes.50 European visitors were shocked by what they considered
the indecency of the umbigada. The German naturalist Georg Wilhelm
Freyreiss, who visited Brazil in 1815-1817, wrote of the batuque
that "one [could] not imagine a more lascivious dance." And Walsh
said that the dance contained "indecencies not fit to be seen or
described." The alleged immorality of the batuque and the samba
caused them to have many opponents, particularly among the clergy.
But ecclesiastical efforts to ban the dances were utterly without
effect. In fact, the batuque and the samba became the favorite
dances of the Brazilian rural lower classes. Some early nine-
teenth-century observers wrote that it was rare to see anything
else.51 But the batuque and other Afro-Brazilian dances were not
performed exclusively on the plantations; they also invaded the
cities, to the consternation of "decent" white society. An ob-
server in 1807 wrote that slaves in Bahia paid no attention what-
ever to government orders, and gathered when and where they wished,
"dancing and playing their noisy and dissonant music all over the
city at all hours" and that on holidays and festivals, they com-
pletely dominated the streets, drowning out everything else. The
same thing was true of Rio and other cities, and polite white so-
ciety denounced the spectacle as vulgar, noisy, and uncivilized.52
Another popular Afro-Brazilian dance was the lundu, which had
its origins in Angola. Like other African dances, the lundu was
characterized by the umbigada. This element caused the dance to
be banned by the scandalized King of Portugal, who saw it performed

in his country by slaves brought there in the early 1500's. But it
was reported that the prohibition made the lundu more popular than
ever. It was a suggestive, sensual dance, described by the French-
man L. F. Tollenare in 1817 as "the crudest representation of the
carnal act." In Brazil, the lundu existed not only as a dance,
but also as a song form for solo voice, in which form it became
accepted in the drawing rooms of the whites.53
As Gilberto Freyre warned, one must take care to distinguish
between pure African influences and the influences of the Negro as
slave.54 The Afro-Brazilian music heretofore considered falls in
the former category-it was the black's music for himself. But
the Brazilian black was also a slave, and in his condition of ser-
vitude was forced to provide music not for his own enjoyment, but
for the gratification of his master. Music in this category was
usually European music. But it was performed by blacks, and in
the process was subtly changed-it was Africanized as the slave
left his imprint on it.
During the sugar boom of colonial Brazil, some plantation
owners became extremely wealthy. It became a form of conspicuous
consumption to have as many slaves as possible, and many of these
slaves were specially trained in music for the entertainment of
their masters. In 1610 the Frenchman Frangois Pyrard was sur-
prised to meet a countryman in Brazil-a musician who had been em-
ployed by a large landowner to give instruction to twenty or thirty
slaves and to form them into an orchestra and choir.55 Some such
plantation orchestras were quite impressive. In the 1850's,
Fletcher and Kidder were invited to a concert of a private orches-
tra in Minas Gerais. They expected to hear "a wheezy plantation-
fiddle, a fife, and a drum." But to their astonishment, there was
a regular fifteen-piece orchestra (all black, including the
maestro) of violins, flutes, trombones, bugles, an organ, and a
choir of young Negro boys. They could read music and performed
"with admirable skill and precision," for which the guests were
totally unprepared. An operatic overture was performed, then a
Latin mass, and at the request of the guests, a Sabat Mater.56
Slave musicians were much appreciated, and advertisements for
slaves never failed to cite their musical skills, which made them
more valuable.57
Slaves and free blacks were prominent not only in the music of
the plantations, but also in the "serious" music of the cities. In
the mid-1700's the Jesuits founded a Conservatory of Music near
Rio de Janeiro for the purpose of instructing slaves in music.
This institution, which was popularly known as the "Negro Con-
servatory," produced a number of fine singers and instrumental-
ists.58 And in gold and diamond rich Minas Gerais in the eight-
eenth century, there was a veritable school of mulatto composers,
performers, and teachers. Many of these black and near-black
musicians won recognition even in Portugal. The musicologist
Francisco Curt Lange has called the activity of the mulatto musi-
cians of Minas Gerais "the most intense musical movement produced
in the American hemisphere in the eighteenth century." The
tradition of these black musicians has persisted into the twentieth

century.59 Among the many composers of "serious" (mostly liturgi-
cal) music during this period were Jose Joaquim Emerico Lobo de
Mesquita (a dark mulatto) of Minas Gerais, Jose Mauricio Nunes
Garcia (a black) of Rio, and Luis Alvares Pinto (a mulatto) of
Recife.60
European observers who visited the court at Rio in the first
quarter of the nineteenth century found the quality of both reli-
gious and secular music to be high. And the musicians were almost
exclusively blacks and mulattoes. King Jodo VI was so pleased
with the musical talent of Brazilian blacks that he commissioned
his European composers to write operas to be performed entirely
by Negroes. And he founded a conservatory to perfect the music
education of Brazilian blacks.61
Negro and mulatto musicians dominated not only the serious
music of Brazil, but also the popular music, which began to be im-
portant in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. From ball-
room orchestras to military bands, popular music was in the hands
of blacks of various shades.62 Some slaves took advantage of their
musical talent to earn pocket money for themselves during their
free time.63 Other slaves were exploited by their masters, who saw
in their musicianship an opportunity for profit. In the 1700's and
early 1800's, Brazil boasted many small bands of stringed, percus-
sion, and wind instruments, for hire at both religious and secular
occasions. Most of these musicians were slaves, and (peculiarly)
most were also barbers. Hence, the popular bands of the day were
called barbeiros (barbers).64
The outstanding composers of Brazilian popular music were
mulattoes, as were the performers. The first Brazilian to pursue
a career in popular music abroad was the mulatto Domingos Caldas
Barbosa (1738-1800), who became a sensation singing Brazilian
songs in Portugal. His color was not a serious barrier to his
career, just as the darkness of Brazilian sugar was not a barrier
to its consumption by whites-for although it was dark, never-
theless it was sweet.65
After abolition, in 1888, the barbeiros were supplanted by
other similar black-dominated popular ensembles known as the chOro
and the seresta (both for listening and dancing; the latter accom-
panied by a vocal soloist). These groups played primarily at pri-
vate parties. They were the orchestras of the middle classes.
Performers were usually of lower-middle class origin themselves-
primarily civil servants who supplemented their meagre salaries
through their musical activities. The ch6ro and seresta were re-
markably similar in personnel, instrumentation, rhythm, and style
to the jazz bands which much later became popular in the United
States.66
The dominant role of blacks and mulattoes in the musical life
of Brazil was accompanied by a progressive Africanization of
Brazilian music. The process began slowly, when black performers
consciously or unconsciously injected African stylistic elements
into European popular music. These subtle modifications laid the
foundation for the emergence of a truly Brazilian popular music.
46 Luso-Brazi lian Review
During most of the colonial period, it can be said that there was
no real "Brazilian" music. There was black music, there was white
music; but though there was considerable syncretism between the
two, neither group really accepted the music of the other. It was
only near the end of the eighteenth century that certain musical
forms appeared which were accepted by the entire community.67 The
first syncretized music with obvious African roots to be accepted
by the whole of Brazilian society-black and white alike--was the
lundu cantado, a modified song version of the Afro-Brazilian dance.
The transformation of the lundu from a black folk dance into an
urban popular song had widespread sociological and musical implica-
tions. It contributed to a rise in acceptability not only of the
Negro's music, but also of the Negro himself. More or less con-
temporaneous with the lundu cantado was the modinha, a love song
which was melodically more European than the lunda. But both song
forms showed a distinct Afro-Brazilian flavor, in both language
and rhythm. And both enjoyed wide-scale popular acceptance, both
in Brazil and in Portugal during the last quarter of the eighteenth
century and in the nineteenth century.68
The popularlization of these Afro-Brazilian song forms opened
the way for the general acceptance of other elements of Negro
musical culture. Next was the dance. White society had disdained
the batuque and the primitive samba as being uncivilized slave
dances. But in the 1870's, a new syncretized dance form appeared
in the maxixe, a Brazilian dance which incorporated elements of the
African batuque, the Hispano-American habanera, and the European
polka. The maxixe became widely accepted, and for half a century
remained the urban dance of Brazil. It did not disappear until it
was replaced by another Afro-Brazilian dance-a new and subdued
version of the old samba. The primitive samba had been a folk
music-dance exclusively of the blacks. It was rejected and even
persecuted by white society until it had been "civilized" by the
professionals of the middle class who dominated the radio and
record industries. By the late 1920's, the samba had been watered
down, or tamed, to the taste of middle class whites. The new samba
was a ballroom dance; it had become orchestrated and was often sung.
The African influence was still present, principally in the rhythm,
but the dance had been urbanized and internationalized to make it
more acceptable to non-blacks. By the end of the 1930's, there
were several forms of samba coexisting in Brazil, ranging from the
primitive samba still danced in Bahia to the upper-class version
of the ballrooms of Rio and other lage cities.69
The decade of the 1930's witnessed a wholesale acceptance of
Afro-Brazilian music as the Brazilian music. African elements
which previously had been scrupulously avoided by white society
were now enthusiastically adopted by all Brazilians. Partly, this
change in attitude was a reflection of a general turn toward poly-
rhythm, both in the serious music and in the popular music of the
Western world. The music of Stravinsky and the rise of jazz are
examples of this trend. And partly, the change was the result of
a growing search for Brazilian national self-identity-again re-
flecting a worldwide concern with nationalism and race. In the
search for a Brazilian music, in both serious and popular circles,

the music of the Indians was rejected as having little to offer.
The music of the white European tradition was also rejected be-
cause it ran counter to nationalism-it was too closely identi-
fied with Europe. But the Negro-mulatto music was a viable al-
ternative. Though it had roots in both Africa and in Europe, it
had been syncretized to create an exclusively Brazilian product.70
Hence, this music was seized upon as the inspiration of both popu-
lar and serious composers. Heitor Villa-Lobos, Francisco Mignone,
Camargo Guarnieri, and other composers turned to cult music and
other Afro-Brazilian forms for melodic themes and rhythms.71
Opportunities for black popular musicians were enormously in-
creased. Radio stations, recording companies, clubs, and stage
producers eagerly sought out black singers and instrumentalists
in a stampede for "authentic" Brazilian (meaning Afro-Brazilian)
music. Certain employers who had previously declined to hire
blacks because of race prejudice now enthusiastically welcomed them.
By the late 1930's, Negro musicians almost completely dominated
Brazil's popular music industry. The music they played was more
polished, to be sure, than the music of the slave huts or faveZas
(hillside slums of Rio), but it was still Afro-Brazilian music,
and had been accpeted by all levels of society as their own.72
From colonial days, black performers had been valued by white
society. But they had played white music. Now, not only the
black performer, but also his own music were valued. The process
which transformed a despised branch of Brazilian music into the
Brazilian music had not only musical, but also human repercus-
sions, with an enormous impact on race relations. Since a high
value was being put on black music, there was a transferral of
prestige to the people who had created it.73
The new appreciation of Afro-Brazilian culture manifested it-
self in a changed attitude toward Carnival. At the beginning of
the twentieth century, "nice" Brazilians were embarrassed by the
noisy and exuberant behavior of blacks from the favelas who
danced a primitive version of the samba; but with the Africaniza-
tion of Brazil's popular music and dance, Brazilians began taking
pride in the spectacle, and even participated in it. The Brazilian
Carnival of the mid-twentieth century represented a great triumph
for Negro culture. The music, the dance, and the spirit of the
occasion were all Negro-most of the elements of the European
Carnivals had been dominated or expelled.74 Unfortunately, be-
ginning in the 1960's the spontaneity of Carnival was compromised
when professional designers, choreographers, and artists were
brought in to supervise the spectacle to make it more attractive
to tourists. And the commercialization of music and the indoctrina-
ting powers of the mass media threatened to inhibit the spirit of
freedom and improvisation which was traditionally the essence of
Carnival (and all Negro) music and dance. Yet, though there were
prognostications of gloom, there were also predictions that the
younger generation would keep the spirit of Carnival alive.75
In the late 1950's and the 1960's, the samba was succeeded by
a new Brazilian form, the bossa nova, which became highly popular
48 Luso-Brazi ian Review
not only in Brazil, but in the entire Western world. The bossa
nova had its roots in the samba, in jazz, and in serious music.
Though the worldwide popularity of the bossa nova produced a size-
able export market for Brazilian musicians and their music, some
critics denounced the new music as being a bland and soulless Ameri-
canized dilution of real Brazilian music to suit the taste of the
mass middle-class market of the world.76 It is interesting that
an elderly black sambista interviewed in the mid-1960's leveled a
similar criticism not only at the bossa nova, but also at the
popular samba, which he saw as an insipid bastardization of its
Afro-Brazilian folk music progenitor.77
In one sense, such criticism is well grounded, for the
Africanness of the bossa nova and the popular samba has been
modified to make them more palatable to middle-class whites. And
the influence of American musical styles, particularly in the
bossa nova, is apparent. One critic has denounced this trend as
a sign of degeneration and subservience to foreign tastes. But
it is more reasonable to assess the change as a demonstration of
the increasing sophistication of Brazilian musicians, among whom
blacks continue to play a major role.78
After the military takeover of 1964, the bossa nova was largely
abandoned in Brazil for protest songs based on folk and ethnic
music. This music, too, was in the African tradition, both musi-
cally and socially, for the protest song is a longstanding African
tradition.79
An interesting consequence of the global popularity of Bra-
zilian music is a sort of musical feedback in Africa. Brazilian
(and other Latin American) music, which had its rhythmic origin
in Africa, is now returning to Africa and is being enthusiasti-
cally received and imitated. Hence we can speak of the Afro-
Brazilianization of African music.86
As has been seen, today's Brazilian music is syncretized mu-
sic. It is neither African nor European, but a new music result-
ing from the fusion of different styles. One reason for the suc-
cess of the hybridization of music traditions in Brazil is that the
Brazilian musician himself was nearly always the mulatoo., with the
blood of both black and white races in his veins. The mulatto pre-
dominates in any list of Brazil's greatest performers and composers.
This phenomenon was caused by a powerful social situation. Mis-
cegenation produced a type who was often freed from the hard work of
the fields (many mixed bloods were emancipated by their white fathers)
but who could not enter the land-owning upper ranks of society.
Many a mulatto gravitated to the cities, but there were limited so-
cial and economic roles for him. The field of music, however, pro-
vided a middle path, which made him, if not a gentleman, at least
above the class of manual workers. The mulatto carried within him
the seeds of two cultues, and created a hybrid music fully as mixed
as the blood in his veins. The mixed-blood lacked the correct pro-
nunciation of the Portuguese; he lacked the vigorous energy needed
to maintain the hard rhythms of Negro drums for hours on end; he
took what he liked from each and created a music which, like himself,
was representative of both.81 This was Brazilian music.
NOTES
lThe preparation of this article was financed, in part, by a

Pan American University Research Grant.
2Jose Hon6rio Rodrigues, Brazil and Africa, trans. Richard A.
Mazzara and Sam Hileman (Berkeley, 1965), pp. 40, 41; Arthur Ramos,
A Acultracdo negra no Brasil (Sao Paulo, 1942), pp. 282-288; Donald
Pierson, Negroes in Brazil: A Study of Race Contact at Bahia (Car-
bondale, Illinois, 1967), pp. 31-35.
3This difficulty was noted by Melville J. Herskovits, The Myth
of the Negro Past (New York, 1941), p. 268; and by Oneyda Alvarenga,
"A Influencia negra na musica brasileira," Boletin latino-americano
de mCisica, VI (1946), 358. For the extent of European influence on
African music, see Eric Maria von Hornbostel, "African Negro Music,"
Africa, I, No. 1 (January, 1928), 42, 43; and H. P. Junod, Bantu
Heritage (Johannesburg, 1938), p. 85.
4For the role of music in African society, see Alan P. Merriam,
"African Music," Continuity and Change in African Cultures, ed.
William Russell Bascom and Melville J. Herskovits (Chicago, 1959),
pp. 49-51; J. H. Kwabena Nketia, African Music in Ghana (Evanston,
Illinois, 1963), pp. 4-9; Fred and Lee Warren, The Music of Africa:
An Introduction (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1970), pp. 3-22;
and Rose Brandel, The fMusic of Central Africa: An Ethnomusicologi-
cal Study: Former French Equatorial Africa, the Former Belgian
Congo, Ruanda-Urundi, Uganda, Tanganyika (The Hague, 1961), pp.
20-32, 39 f.
5Robert Stevenson, "Some Portuguese Sources for Early Brazilian
Music History," Inter-American Institute for Musical Research:
Yearbook, IV (1968), 21.
6Hornbostel, "African Negro Music," p. 60.
7See, respectively: Junod, Bantu Heritage, p. 85; and Adolphe
Louis Cureau, Savage Man in Central Africa: A Study of Primitive
Races in the French Congo, trans. E. Andrews (London, 1915), p. 88.
8Brandel, Music of Central Africa, pp. 47, 48; Edoardo Vidos-
sich, 0 Negro e a musica (n.p., n.d.), pp. 21-23.
9William Bosman, A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of
Guinea: Divided into the Gold, the Slave, and the Irovy Coasts, ed.
John R. Willis and J. D. Fage (originally published in Dutch in
1704) (London, 1967), pp. 138-140; Richard and John Lander, The
Niger Journal, ed. Robin Hallett (first published in 1832) (New
York 1965), pp. 62, 82.
OThis has been pointed out by the Cuban musicologist Leon
Argeliers, in "Miusica popular de origen africano en America
Latina," America indigena, XXIX, No. 3 (julio de 1969), 637.
1"Melville J. Herskovits, The New World Negro: Selected
Papers in Afroamerican Studies, ed. Frances S. Herskovits
(Bloomington, Illinois, 1966), p. 169; Merriam, "African Music,"
pp. 75-80; Gilbert Rouget, "Musique de 1'Afrique noire," Histoire
de la musique, I (Paris, 1960), 215, 216; Vidossich, 0 Negro, pp.
15, 16; Geoffrey Gorer, Africa Dances: A Book about West African
Negroes (New York, 1962). D. 214.
12Raymond Mauny, Tableau ggographique de 'oust africain an

moyen age, d'apres les sources ecrites, la tradition et Z'
archoZogie (Ifan-Dakar, 1961), pp. 535 f.
13Arthur Ramos, 0 Folk-lore negro do BrasiZ: demopsicologia e
psicanalise (Rio de Janeiro, 1935), pp. 129-131; Arthur Ramos,
0 Negro brasileiro: ethnographia reZigiosa e psychan6lyse (Rio de
Janeiro, 1934), pp. 149, 150; Hugo Zemp, Musique dan: la musique
dans la pensee et la vie sociale d'une societe africaine (Paris,
1971), 184-188.
14Hornbostel, "African Negro Music," p. 59; Mario de Andrade,
Misica de feiticaria no BrasiZ, ed. Oneyda Alvarenga (Sao Paulo,
1963), pp. 39, 46.
15For a review of some of these theories, see Merriam, "Afri-
can Music," pp. 57-65.
16See, for example, Nketia, African Music, pp. 64-93; and
Vidossich 0 Negro, p. 17. The physical articulation of the beat is
characteristic of Negro musicians everywhere. Black singers in
the U.S., for instance, "dance the song" in stark contrast to the
normal immobility of white performers. See Alan Merriam, The
Anthropology of Music (Evanston, Illinois, 1964), p. 109.
17Richard A. Waterman, "African Influence on the Music of the
Americas," Acculturation in the Americas, ed. Sol Tax, Proceedings
of the Twenty-ninth International Congress of Americanists, Vol.
II (Chicago, 1952), 211, 212.
18Hornbostel, "African Negro Music," pp. 52-55; Merriam,
"African Music," pp. 57-68; Waterman, "African Influence," p. 212;
Warren, Music of Africa, pp. 31 ff.; Brandel, Music of Central
Africa, pp. 14-17, 73 ff.
19See, for example: Nestor R. Ortiz Oderigo, La Presencia del
negro en la musica del Brasil (Buenos Aires, 1965), p. 7; Maria
de Lourdes Borges Ribeiro, "Folclore musical de Angola-povo
quioco," Revista brasileira de folclore, VIII, No. 22 (setembro/
dezembro de 1968), 285-292; Gorer, Africa Dances, p. 214; Junod,
Bantu Heritage, p. 85; Waterman, "African Influence," p. 212.
20Brandel, Music of Central Africa, pp. 14, 17, 73 f.;
Warren, Music of Africa, pp. 31-35.
21Eric Maria von Hornbostel, "American Negro Songs," Inter-
national Review of Missions, XV, No. 60 (October, 1926), 750;
"African Negro Music," pp. 52-55.
22Mieczyslaw Kolinski, "La Musica del oeste africano; musica
europea y extraeuropea," trans. Francisco Curt Lange, Revista de
estudios musicales, I, No. 2 (Mendoza, Argentina; diciembre de
1949), 210-215.
230rtiz Oderigo, "Presencia," p. 4; Hornbostel, "African
Negro Music," pp. 40-45; Nketia, African Music, pp. 27-33;
Herskovits, Myth, p. 265.
24Waterman, "African Influence," pp. 207-215; Kokinski,
"Musica," pp. 214 ff.
25Ibid.
26Waterman, "African Influence," p. 209; John S. Roberts,
Black Music of Two Worlds (New York, 1972), pp. 81, 82.
27Vidossich, 0 Negro, p. 30; Luis Heitor Correa de Azevedo,
Brief History of Music in Brazil, trans. Elizabeth M. Tylor and

Mercedes de Moura Reis (Washington, D.C., 1948), pp. 52 f.
28Rodrigues, Brazil and Africa, pp. 40, 41; Waterman, "African
Influence," p. 209; Oneyda Alvarenga, Musica popular brasileira
(Rio de Janeiro, 1950), pp. 17-22; Luciano Gallet, Estudos de
folclore (Rio de Janeiro, 1934), pp. 37-44.
29Pierson, Negroes, pp. 31-40; Gallet, Estudos, p. 50; Rodrigues,
Brazil and Africa, pp. 41-45.
30Rodrigues, Brazil and Africa, p. 43.
31Argeliers, "Misica popular," p. 638, 639; Gilberto Freyre,
Order and Progress: Brazil from Monarchy to Republic, ed. and
trans. Rod W. Horton (New York, 1970), pp. 69, 70. For the value
of music as an emotional release, see Merriam, Anthropology of
Music, pp. 219-225.
320rtiz Oderigo, Presencia, pp. 1-10; Renato Almeida, Hist6ria
da musica brasileira (2. ed.; Rio de Janeiro, 1942), pp. 136-147;
Waldemar Valente, Sobrevivencias daomenas nos grupos-de-culto
afronordestinos (Recife, 1964), passim: Melville J. Herskovits,
"Drums and Drummers in Afro-Brazilian Cult Life," Musical Quarter-
ly, XXX (October, 1944), 477-492; Pierson, Negroes, pp. 74 f.,
237-317; Rene Ribeiro, Cultos afrobrasileiros do Recife: un es-
tudo de ajustamento social, "Boletim Especial do Instituto Joaquim
Nabuco" (Recife, 1952), passim; Melville J. Herskovits and Richard
A. Waterman, "Musica de culto afrobahiana," trans. Francisco
Curt Lange, Revista de estudios musicales, I, No. 2 (diciembre de
1949), 68 ff.; Renato Almeida, Tablado folcl6rico (Sao Paulo,
1961), pp. 29-31; Ramos, Acultracdo negra, pp. 145-157; Andrade,
Mtsica de feiticaria, pp. 26-33.
33For African instruments, see Vidossich, 0 Negro, pp. 17-
19; Gorer, Africa Dances, pp. 214 f.; Brandel, Music of Central
Africa, passim; George W. Ellis, Negro Culture in West Africa:
A Social Study of the Negro Group of Vai-speaking People (New
York, 1914), p. 45; Cureau, Savage Man, pp. 88-90; Hornbostel,
"African Negro Music," passim; Mauny, Tableau, pp. 335 f.
34Pierson, Negroes, pp. 238 f.; Renato Almeida, Compendio de
hist6ria da misica brasileira (2 ed.; Rio de Janeiro, 1958), p.
141; Argeliers, "Misica popular," p. 640; Raymundo Nina Rodrigues,
Os Africanos no Brasil, rev. Homero Pires (2. ed.; Sao Paulo,
1935), p. 235; Herskovits, "Drums and Drummers," pp. 477-492.
35Ramos, 0 Negro, pp. 161 ff.; Vidossich, 0 Negro, pp. 17, 18,
56; Gallet, Estudos, pp. 59 ff.; Pierson, Negroes, p. 251.
36Herskovits, "Drums and Drummers," pp. 477-492.
37Robert Walsh, Notices of Brazil in 1828 and 1829 (2 vols.;
London, 1830), II, 337.
38Vidossich, 0 Negro, pp. 17, 18; Ramos, 0 Negro, p. 162;
Pierson, Negroes, pp. 45, 251.
39For descriptions and illustrations of Afro-Brazilian in-
struments, see: Vidossich, 0 Negro, p. 56; Pierson, Negroes, pp.
74, 251, 252, 289 f.; Rossini Tavares de Lima, "Musica folcl6rica
e instrumentos musicals do Brasil," Primera Conferencia Inter-
americana de Etnomusicologia: Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, 24 a
28 de febrero de 1963; Trabajos presentados (Washington, D.C.,
1965), pp. 206-211; Alceu Maynard Araujo, FolcZore nacional (3

vols.; Sao Paulo, 1964), II, 412-451; Almeida, Hist6ria da
mtisica, pp. 113-116; Gallet, Estudos, pp. 59-61; Ortiz Oderigo,
Presencia, illustrations facing pp. 3, 6; Alvarenga, Pltsica
popular, pp. 303-314; Maria Graham, Journal of a Voyage to Brazil
and Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823
(London, 1824), pp. 198, 199; Walsh, Notices, II, 175, 176, 335-
337.
40Herskovits, "Drums and Drummers," pp. 477-492.
41Graham, Journal, p. 155.
42Work songs, of course, are universal, and not peculiar to
Africa. All peoples of the world have had their work songs, to
take advantage of the rhythmic stimulus of music to lighten the
burden of strenuous or monotonous work. Music is piped into to-
day's factories and other places of work to exploit this effect.
43Vidossich, 0 Negro, p. 26; Jose Teixeira d'Assumpcao, Curso
de folclore musical brasiZeiro (Rio de Janeiro, 1967), pp. 127-
133; Nestor R. Ortiz Oderigo, La Mtsica afronorteamericana (Buenos
Aires, 1962), pp. 16-24.
44John Luccock, Notas sObre o Rio-de-Janeiro e partes meridion-
ais do Brasil, tomandas durante uma estada de dez anos nesse pais,
de 1808 a 1818, trans. Milton da Silva Rodrigues (English version
originally published in 1820) (Sdo Paulo, 1942), pp. 73, 74; Walsh,
Notices, II, 335, 336; James Cooley Fletcher and Daniel Parish
Kidder, Brazil and the Brazilians (Philadelphia, 1857), pp. 29,
30, 84, 476; Francois-Auguste Biard, Deux annes au Brgsil (Paris,
1862), pp. 89, 90.
45Assumpgao, Curso, pp. 127-133; Almeida, Hist6ria da musica,
pp. 108-110.
46Luis Heitor Correa de Azevedo, "Vissungos; Negro Work Songs
of the Diamond District in Minas Gerais, Brazil," Inter-American
Music Bulletin, No. 68 (November, 1968), pp. 6-8; Aires da Mata
Machado Filho, 0 Negro e o garimpo em Minas Gerais (Rio de Janeiro,
1943) pp. 57-106.
4See, for instance: Frangois Pyrard, The Voyage of Francois
Pyrard of LavaZ to the East Indies, the MaZdives, the MoZuccas and
Brazil, trans. and ed. Albert Gray and H. C. P. Bell (2 vols. in 3;
Hakluyt Society, 1st Ser., Nos. 76, 77, 80; New York, 1964), II,
part II, 139 f.; Walsh, Notices, II, 337, 338; Karl Friedrich
Phillipp von Martius and Johann Baptist von Spix, Travels in
Brazil, trans. H. E. Lloyd (2 vols.; London, 1824), II,
114, 153; Henry Koster, Travels in Brazil (2 vols.; Philadelphia,
1817), I, 319.
48Almeida, Hist6ria da misica, pp. 203, 279; Gallet, Estudos,
pp. 56, 57; Almeida, Tablado, pp. 69-82; Ortiz Oderigo, Presencia,
pp. 2-4; Luis da Camara Cascudo (ed.), Antologia do folclore
brasiZeiro (4. ed.; Sao Paulo, 1971), p. 94.
49Walsh, Notices, II, 337, 338.
50Almeida, Hist6ria da mDsica, pp. 151-161; Ortiz Oderigo,
Presencia, p. 1; Alvarenga, "A Influencia," p. 363; Mario de
Andrade, Aspectos da musica brasiZeira (Sao Paulo, 1965), pp. 148
ff.; Gilberto Freyre, The Mansions and the Shanties; The Making of
Modern Brazil, trans. and ed. Harriet de Onfs (New York, 1968), p.
253; Pierson, Negroes, p. 249.
51Cascudo, Antologia, p. 74; Walsh, Notices, II, 337, 338,
243, 244; Martius and Spix, Travels, II, 114.
52Nina Rodrigues, Os Africanos, pp. 234-236.
53Almeida, Hist6ria da misica, pp. 72-78; Luis da Camara Cascu-
do, Made in Africa: pesquisas e notas (Rio de Janeiro, 1965), pp.
50-53. For the Tollenare quote, see Cascudo, Antologia, p. 88.
54Gilberto Freyre, The Masters and the Slaves, ed. and trans.
Samuel Putnam (2nd rev. ed.; New York, 1956), pp. 321 ff.
55Pyrard, Voyage, II, part II, 323.
56Fletcher and Kidder, Brazil, p. 441.
57Jose Ramos Tinhorao, Musica popular: um tema em debate (Rio
de Janeiro, 1966), p. 110; Mario de Andrade, Pequena hist6ria da
mtsica (Sao Paulo, 1942), p. 150.
58Arthur Ramos, The Negro in Brazil, trans. Richard Pattee
(Washington, D.C., 1939), p. 119.
59Francisco Curt Lange, "Os Compositores na Capitania Geral das
Minas Gerais," Estudos hist6ricos, Nos. 3, 4 (Mar?lia, Brazil;
dezembro de 1965), pp. 35-111; and "La Misica en Minas Gerais: un
informe preliminar," Boletin latino-americano de musica, VI (1946),
409-494; and "A M6sica na Vila Real de Sabara," Estudos hist6ricos,
No. 5 (Marflia, Brazil; dezembro de 1966), pp. 97-198 (quote from
p. 99); Stevenson, "Portuguese Sources," pp. 22-27.
60Luis Heitor Correa de Azevedo, 150 anos de musica no Brasil,
1800-1950 (Rio de Janeiro, 1956), pp. 27-43; and Brief History,
pp. 56 ff.; Lange, "Os Compositores," pp. 33-111; Padre Jaime C.
Diniz, "Revelacao de um compositor brasileiro do seculo XVIII,"
Inter-American Institute for Musical Research; Yearbook, IV (1968),
82-97.
61Stevenson, "Portuguese Sources," pp. 24, 25; Martius and
Spix, Travels, I, 16, 17; Graham, Journal, pp. 168, 187, 197.
62Ramos, The Negro, p. 119; Walsh, Notices, I, 136, 137, II,
99 f.
63Graham, Journal, p. 166.
64Marieta Alves, "Misica de barbeiros," Revista brasileira de
folclore, VII, No. 17 (janeiro/abril de 1967), 5-14; Tinhorao,
Masica popular, pp. 107 f.; Walsh, Notices, I, 472 f.
65Baptista Siqueira, Tres vultos hist6ricos da mDsica brasi-
leira: Mesquita-Callado-Anacleto (Rio de Janeiro, 1970), passim;
Andrade, Pequena hist6ria, p. 150; Freyre, Order and Progress, pp.
75 f.; Jose Ramos Tinhorao, 0 Samba que agora vai: a farsa da
misica popular no exterior (Rio de Janeiro, 1969), pp. 11-17;
Gerard Behague, "Biblioteca da Ajuda (Lisbon) MSS 1595;1596: Two
Eighteenth-Century Anonymous Collections of Modinhas," Inter-
American Institute for Musical Research; Yearbook, IV (1968), 46,
47.
66Unfortunately, the ch6ro and the seresta had been practi-
cally eliminated by competition from radio and phonograph by 1930.
But by then, a new music form had been created-the ch6ro. See
Gallet, Estudos, pp. 62, 63; Tinhorao, Mtsica popular, pp. 102-106.
67Andrade, Aspectos, pp. 30 f.
68See the unpublished thesis (Tulane University, 1966) of

Gerard Behague, "Popular Musical Currents in the Art Music of the
Early Nationalistic Period in Brazil, circa 1870-1920," pp. 30-46;
and Behague, "Biblioteca," pp. 44-47, 54-68. See also: Cascuda,
Made in Africa, pp. 50-53; Albert Friedenthal, Pusik, Tanz und
Dichtung bei den Kreolen Amerikas (Berlin-Wilmersdorf, 1913),
p. 312; Almeida, Hist6ria da musica, pp. 189-191; Ramos, 0 Folk-
lore, 131-148; Freyre, Order and Progress, p. 72.
69Tinhorae, Masica popular, pp. 12, 13; Almeida, Hist6ria da
mfsica, pp. 191-193; Ortiz Oderigo, Presencia, pp. 1, 2; Pierson,
Negroes, p. 249; Luis Delgado Gardel, Escolas de samba (Rio de
Janeiro, 1967), pp. 125-128; Joao Baptista Borges Pereira, Cor,
professao e mobilidade: o negro e o Radio de Sao Paulo (Sao
Paulo, 1967), pp. 214-217.
70Correa de Azevedo, Brief History, pp. 54 f.; Borges
Pereira, COr, pp. 193-207.
71Vidossich, 0 Negro, pp. 57-62; Borges Pereira, Cor, pp. 209-
210; Behague, "Popular Music Currents," passim; Ramos, The Negro,
pp. 116 f.; Almeida, Hist6ria da misica, p. 147.
72Nestor Ortiz Oderigo, Kostros de bronce: musicos nearos de
ayer y de hoy (Buenos Aires, 1964), pp. 124-133; Borges Pereira,
COr, pp. 193-235; Ramos, The Negro, p. 121.
73Borges Pereira, COr, pp. 192-235.
74Nina Rodrigues, Os Africanos, p. 236; Freyre, Order and
Progress, pp. xix f.; Almeida, Hist6ria da mhisica, pp. 196-202.
75Edigar de Alencar, 0 CarnavaZ carioca atravgs da misica (2
vols.; Rio de Janeiro, 1965), I, 24-26; Tinhordo, Misica popular,
pp. 71-83; Gardel, EscoZas, passim.
76A Ramalho Neto, Historinha do desafinado (bossa nova) (Rio
de Janeiro, 1965), pp. 11-38; Tinhorao, Masica popular, pp. 11-52.
77Borges Pereira, COr, p. 217; Tinhorao, 0 Samba, pp. 69-147.
78Not all black and mulatto musicians wear race labels to dis-
tinguish them, but one need only look through the pictures in the
following to see the distinguished place the Negro has had in
contemporary Brazilian popular music: Ramalho Neto, Historinha;
Lucio Rangel, Sambistas e chorOes: aspectos e figuras da m6sica
popular brasileira (Sao Paulo, 1962); Ary Vasconcelos, Panorama da
misica popular brasileira (2 vols.; Sao Paulo, 1964).
79Thomas E. Weil et al., Area Handbook for Brazil (Washington,
D.C., 1971), pp. 232 f.; Merriam, "African Music," pp. 51-55.
80Merriam, "African Music," pp. 82, 83.
81For the place of the mulatto in Brazilian society in general,
see Carl N. Degler, Neither Black nor White: Slavery and Race
Relations in Brazil and the United States (New York, 1971).

African Influences On The Music of Brazil

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African Influences On The Music of Brazil

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African Influences on the Music of Brazil

Author(s): David E. Vassberg

In Brazil, as in the United States, in Cuba, and in other

In order to properly assess the extent of Negro musical influ-

for: nursing babies, educating the young, initiations into tribal

From their earliest contacts with black music, white Europeans

own characteristics, subdivisions, and variations. Generally, it

native to Africa. There is no definitive answer, as yet. Some

African religions. But the music-even as late as the mid-

words they sang. Possibly they were Brazilian-born, and had

originated in Angola as a form of personal combat, and was intro-

be banned by the scandalized King of Portugal, who saw it performed

tradition of these black musicians has persisted into the twentieth

search for a Brazilian music, in both serious and popular circles,

lThe preparation of this article was financed, in part, by a

12Raymond Mauny, Tableau ggographique de 'oust africain an

Brief History of Music in Brazil, trans. Elizabeth M. Tylor and

1965), pp. 206-211; Alceu Maynard Araujo, FolcZore nacional (3

68See the unpublished thesis (Tulane University, 1966) of

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