Brazzil
Music
March 2003
CARTOLA (Angenor de Oliveira)
Rio de Janeiro: October 11, 1908 - November 30, 1980"Cartola didn't exist. He was a dream that we had."
Nelson SargentoThe people from the morros (hills) of Rio de Janeiro were marginalized and virtually unnoticed except for two specific times in history when the entire country recognized and sang their songs. Beginning with composer Ismael Silva in the 1930s and continuing with Angenor de Oliveira later in the decade, they proved that the composers of the morros made important contributions to Brazilian history.
When Silva was popular—during the 30s—Mário Reis, Francisco Alves, Sílvio Caldas, and other elegant, white, middle-class singers in search of a cooler repertoire, began to discover the group of super talented composers living in the budding favelas in Rio's morros. These favelas were born from the mixing of miserable former soldiers of the Canudos War and the homeless banished from downtown and as a result of reconstruction and "cleaning" efforts carried out by Mayor Pereira Passos in the 1910s.
Chico Viola and Mario Reis questioned the first-rate material that emerged because youngsters such as Wilson Batista and Ismael had already left the morro to go down to the Praça Tiradentes to sell music and get to know others in the industry. Undoubtedly the ambition of both parts, however, was stronger than any discrimination based on skin color, money or geography. Chico Alves, was the first on the scene and the smarter. Driving his cheap convertible, he use to mingle with all these black guys creating musical partnerships that often times didn't really exist— some say they never existed. Along with Ismael Silva and Nilton Bastos, he built a collection of hits that included pearls like the maxixe-like "Se Você Jurar." When Nilton died, Chico Alves hired a talented youngster named Noel Rosa to get involved in the business.
This group was able to show the world that if Vila Isabel had the best samba of these times—a new samba that was white, clean, middle-class with a feitiço sem farofa (spell without vulgarity)—the composers from the hills were also doing fine. The difference was that the samba echoing from the hills was more black, marginal with stronger African beats. While the middle class was remixing a rhythm born in Bahia with waltzes and polkas the morro felt the force of African candomblé
An then it happened. It was the year of the Lord of 1928, when mandarin Mário Reis was introduced to a black, skinny boy named Angenor, who created a different style of samba: slower, more romantic with lyrical, highly-cultured words, dressed in melodies that were almost modinha. He ended up buying one of the songs for a measly 300 mirréis (thousand reals). It was called "Infeliz Sorte" and ended up being recorded by his "brother" Chico Alves, who desperately fell in love with the song. Chico was a natural talent scout and saw that the boy, although unknown outside of the Morro de Mangueira, was legendary inside. There should be a reason for such fame.
The black vinyl pleased and Angenor started to become famous though the vocal cords of the most popular singer of his time. Always for 300 thousand réis Chico would still buy, record and keep the rights of another half a dozen composition by the youngster. In an agreement between the two, at least the name of the true composer would always be on the 78 rpm label. Their greatest success would be "Divina Dama" in 1928.
Cartola became famous, but he didn't make any money nor was he known as Cartola at the time. He, a true black lord, later received the nickname Cartola (top hat) while working as a mason. For a true gentleman like Cartola, his profession wasn't a concern: if it were meant to be that he would be a mason, he would be the best mason in the morro. And, if he was meant to work with whitewash and cement, in order not get his hair dirty he would always wear a very elegant… Cartola. And this top hat was always kept impeccably clean only being taken off to greet women that passed on the street, whispering his name to others.
This fame would give him, although for a short period of time, the status he had lost when his affluent grandpa died along with the good life he had enjoyed with him as a child. From the time his grandpa died, the boy was alone; he moved from the aristocratic Catete neighborhood to the outskirts of the city by the first train stop en route to the suburbs that had an immense mangueira (mango tree). He would make the station famous as Estação primeira, da Mangueira.
After the loss of his family, the young Angenor revolted. He was such a problem that he was thrown out of the house when he was 15 years old. By the time, smaller groups called blocos and ranchos were all the rage during Carnaval. Once again, Ismael Silva came out ahead and in 1929 created a gismo called Deixa Falar (Let Them Talk). This became the first Escola de Samba (Samba Club). It wasn't long after that Angenor's morro would respond with its Escola de Samba Estação Primeira de Mangueira. He would become co-founder, music director and one of the club's heads.
Meanwhile, fame outside the morro disappeared as fast as it had come. The black boy was recorded by greats like Mário Reis, Sílvio Caldas and Francisco Alves, Carmen Miranda and Araci de Almeida, but he wasn't interested in being a radio artist. An avant la lettre Paulinho da Viola, his game was to play in a quiet bar with friends for beautiful brunettes who lived nearby. Many of who brought him many problems until he found his Zica decades later. While people of other morros such as Ismael, Wilson, Ataulfo Alves, and Geraldo Pereira later, became famous, Cartola and his Mangueira group—he, Nelson Cavaquinho, Carlos Cachaça, Nelson Sargento—would continue there, amusing each other, for the next 30 years.
Stokowski's Call
Then came the second coming of the morro. At the end of the 1950s and into the 1960s, no one outside the Mangueira remembered Cartola. Many people thought he had died. The last report they had on him was in 1940, when American conductor Leopold Stokowski came to Brazil— evidently in a gesture of total unselfishness and absolute generosity and having nothing to do with the Good Neighbor policy that was in its peak— to record some native specimens of the musical fauna in his mobile studio. By the way, a studio that was a boat and from which Stokowski almost never left. Cartola, almost forced by his friend in faith and quasi-brother Heitor Villa-Lobos, participated in the recordings.
After this, Angenor decided to leave his beloved Mangueira, disillusioned by the modern adaptations in the samba schools he had created. While away, he had terrible love interests that almost destroyed him and, after many years, he ended up back in the morro. And, one day while working as a car washer in a garage and drinking like a fish, he was approached by chance by journalist and humorist Sérgio Pôrto— the Stanislaw Ponte Preta. It too Pôrto some time to realize that the old, sick, toothless man with a destroyed nose because of a benign tumor was Cartola. When he found it out, he almost had a heart attack. The famous journalist adopted Cartola and his situation then started to improve.
A few years later, samba de raiz (root, traditional samba)— that many people believed had been buried by bossa nova— became popular among students and intellectuals in Rio, partly because of a record that former bossa nova muse Nara Leão recorded with these sambistas. Zona Sul tourists and intellectuals invaded the gafieiras (traditional dancehalls). Like a true expert, Cartola proposed that he and his last spouse, Zica, open a house where she cooked and he performed live. Thus was born the legendary Zicartola. It was a success. From people of the morro to sociologists and journalists, everyone was interested in a fine samba pagode .
Among the many other stars that appeared in Zicartola was a young disciple that could sing and compose music like Cartola by using the same melodies and noble verses of the master: Paulinho da Viola. The success of Zicartola was a rediscovery of talent for the world. At 65 years old, with a new nose, Cartola recorded his first LP. That was 1974 and the record won all the awards at the time.
Three more songs from the mold became instant classics: As Rosas Não Falam, Acontece, Autonomia and O Mundo é um Moinho. They eventually lost track of the number of recordings produced. Cartola was celebrated and became an obligatory resource, myth, hero and father of Brazilian music in an age when heroes have been retired for a long time. Every generation after bossa nova, from Elis to Fagner, recorded the master.
Unfortunately, the success during his life didn't last long. Broken down because of a variety of illnesses aggravated by a drinking problem, the not so old genius that was weakened and weary went at the height of his success, without living to see his name mentioned in seven out of 10 Brazilian rock songs in the 90s. His last word, repeated before he died, for 15 minutes: Acabou (It ended).
As it happened only a few times in his life, he was wrong. Who was a dream never ends.
Translated by Jamie Popp - poppsun@aol.com
Arthur de Faria, the author, a journalist, writer, and musician from Rio Grande do Sul, may be contacted at arthurdefa@hotmail.com