Brasil Brasil!: "From Samba to Bossa” - BBC Documentary
A three-part series from BBC
Episode-2: Tropicalia Revolution
The series offers a detailed account of the years in which Brazilian music has evolved and constantly changed, while capturing the global imagination. Filmed at Brazil’s massive carnival celebrations, in the lawless favelas, the extraordinary maracatu ceremonies of the northern countryside, and in the music clubs of Salvador and Rio, these three, hour-long films chronicle Brazilian music from the birth of samba right through to the hip-hop, baile and funk scenes.
Episode-1: Samba to Bossa Nova
The series starts in the days of slavery, when an estimated 4 million
Africans were forcibly moved to Brazil, and traces the development of
samba from the poor black areas of Salvador and Rio, where it was
initially banned, to its fusion with European styles and its move to the
mainstream.The programme follows the career of samba's most successful
and glamorous international star, Carmen Miranda, and the growth of the
samba schools that dominate the Rio carnival. It traces the fight-back
by musicians from the poor Northeast, who used a rival style, forro, to
sing about the harsh realities of their lives, and shows how politics
helped the development of a sophistcated new samba-jazz fusion,
bossanova, from the Fifties, that was to bring international success to
Joao Gilberto and Tom Jobim.
Episode-2: Tropicalia Revolution
The second programme in the series covers the military era in Brazil,
from 1964-85, and discusses the role that musicians played in leading
the fight-back – and how they suffered as a result. The era began with
the left-wing protest movement headed by singers like Nara Leao, that
was matched against rival styles that ranged from the passionate singing
of Elis Regina to the rousing pop songs of Jorge Ben – with television
song contests developing into a battle-ground between supporters of
different styles.All this changed in the late Sixties, with the
emergence of the experimental tropicalia movement, determined to shake
up Brazil just as military hardliners took control of the government.
The programme chronicles the careers of the tropicalia stars, from Os
Mutantes to Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso, who were both jailed and
exiled to Britain (and includes never shown footage of them both
performing at the Isle of Wight festival). It describes the military
censorship campaign against such leading musicians as Chico Buarque,
Milton Nascimento, and even Jorge Ben. And it shows how black musicians
in Bahia state responded by developing new, and often militant black
styles like samba-reggae.
Episode-3: A Tale of Four Cities