Just when the richness and variety of samba seemed to be disappearing and its rhythm compromised by a thing called "swing," pure samba has returned. On the eve of Carnaval, Martinho da Vila, Arlindo Cruz & Sombrinha, Zeca Pagodinho, and Paulinho da Viola have released carefully produced recordings that serve as a public declaration for the integrity of a form that began 80 years ago with the official release of "Pelo Telefone" (On the Phone).
Unique among this group of composers is Paulinho da Viola, an ambassador of samba, who has broken a silence in Brazil of almost eight years with the release of Bebadosamba (Drunk with Samba) on BMG. One of his most insightful projects, Bebadosamba is a manifesto for the veracity of samba and of Paulinho da Viola. Taking advantage of this momentous occasion, his former record company, EMI, decided to release Paulinho's complete EMI discography including some titles recorded during the original sessions that did not appear on the LP configurations. The eleven (out of print unavailable) LPs, recorded between 1968 and 1979, were digitally remastered in CD format at Abbey Road Studios in England and provide the listener an opportunity to re-evaluate the composer's role in the world of MPB (Brazilian Popular Music).
Paulo César Batista de Faria (Paulinho da Viola) is the son of César Faria, the legendary choro guitar player who worked with Pixinguinha and Jacó do Bandolim during the period that came to be known as Época de Ouro (Golden Era). Paulinho was musically educated in his father's circuit of traditional MPB before it became contaminated by importations of North American rock, blues, and jazz. In the early 1960s Paulinho accompanied Rio's leading samba composers at Zicartola. The restaurant (operated by Cartola, the venerable composer and co-founder of the escola de samba Mangueira) was the center of the choro and samba scene.
Before the end of that decade Viola had participated in three of the Roda de Samba recording sessions alongside eminent sambistas like Zé Keti and Nélson Sargento. Paulinho's first recording as a featured artist, Na Madrugada (In the Dawn), was shared with his good friend from the old Aprendizes de Lucas samba school, Elton Medeiros. Indecisive on his solo debut in 1968, Paulinho used the conventional heavy strings and brass orchestrations so typical of the time and that nearly suffocate tunes like "Coisas do Mundo, Minha Nega" (Things of the World, My Honey), "Doce Veneno" (Sweet Venom), and "Não te Dói a Consciência?" (Isn't Your Conscience Troubling You?) by composer Nélson Cavaquinho. Paulinho recorded "Coisas do Mundo, Minha Nega" for the second time on Memórias Cantando from 1976 in a more intimate setting.
His third recording as a featured artist (second for EMI) in 1970 brought Portela's unofficial anthem, the emblematic "Foi um Rio que Passou em Minha Vida" (There Was a River That Passed Through My Life) and other classics like "Nada de Novo" (Nothing New), "Tudo Se Transformou" (Everything Has Changed), and "Para Não Contrariar Você" (In Order Not to Contradict You).
The recording is propelled by intense pandeiro, tamborim, cuíca, and ganzá rhythms, yet grounded by the infallible bass playing of Dininho (son of Dino Sete Cordas). With Foi um Rio Que Passou em Minha Vida, Paulinho established his intimate, clear, almost minimalistic ensemble sonority and solidified his partnership with pianist Cristóvão Bastos. During the military dictatorship (1964-85) Paulinho transferred the heart of samba into new formats and experimented with diverse combinations in order to protest the political situation of the country. Through humor and acute social sensibility, he described the mores of the country and created titles that became standards of the repertoire. Paulinho spoke of a marginal life with skill and sensitivity:
Se o homem nasceu bom
E bom não se conservou
A culpa é da sociedade
Que o transformou
If the man was born good
And turns bad
The blame is on the society
That changed him
Accepting his role as a chronologist, Paulinho wrote lyrics that the public understood but whose metaphors eluded the censors. Subordinating the vocabulary of the heart while respecting the origins of samba and choro, he tickled the dictatorship between the lines of "Meu Novo Sapato" (My New Shoe) and "Reclamação" (Complaint). He embraced the concept of ecology in the explicit samba enredo "Amor à Natureza." And with the vision of a historian, he recovered lost pearls by building a virtual anthology of the masters of MPB from Noel Rosa to Cartola:
Cartola:
"Acontece" (It Happens)
"Amor Proibido" (Forbidden Love)
"Vai Amigo" (Go My Friend)
"Não Quero Mais Amar a Ninguém" (I Don't Want to Love Anybody Else)
Nélson Cavaquinho:
"Depois da Vida" (After Life)
"Não te Dói a Consciência?" (Isn't Your Conscience Troubling You?)
"Duas Horas da Manhã" (Two O'clock in the Morning)
Noel Rosa:
"Pra Que Mentir" (Why Should You Lie)
Candeia:
"Filosofia do Samba" (Philosophy of the Samba)
"Batuqueiro" (Drummer)
Nelson Sargento:
"Minha Vez de Sorrir" (My Time to Smile)
Casquinha:
"Mudei de Opinião" (I Changed My Opinion)
Zé Keti:
"O Meu Pecado" (My Sin)
Pixinguinha:
"Cinco Companheiros" (Five Friends)
"Cuidado Colega" (Careful My Friend)
Pixinguinha and Benedito Lacerda:
"Segura Ele" (Hold Him)
Ary Barroso:
"Chorando" (Crying)
Concerned with the orthodoxy of the samba, with Carnaval becoming a commercialized enterprise, and with the escolas selecting their Carnaval themes by the pressure from drug lords; Paulinho left Portela around 1974 to create the escola Quilombo. (Quilombo is now extinct; Paulinho returned to Portela in 1996.) At that time he wrote "Argumento":
Tá legal
Eu aceito o argumento
Mas não me altere
O samba tanto assim
It's okay
I accept the argument
But don't alter my
Samba so much
Nonetheless, Paulinho's respect for tradition should not be confused with nostalgia for past times. His creativity and musical concept make him, above all else, a rejuvenator of traditional Brazilian music. Who isn't familiar with "Sinal Fechado" (Red Light)? Written in 1969 when military repression was at its height, it became the symbol of an era and winner of TV Record's music festival. "Roendo as Unhas" (Nail Biting), a samba where harmonies are resolved in unusual, unexpected ways, was also written when Brazil was under military rule and mirrored a time when no one trusted his neighbor, when everyone was left alone with his worries in a society where warm and personal communication has always been an integral part of daily life.
These tunes, full of musical daring and radical innovations, were recorded again in 1993 when Paulinho returned to the studios after a 4 year voluntary absence to record some of his biggest hits on Samba e Choro Negro. The CD was released by the World Network label in Europe, Japan, and the United States, but not in Brazil.
Technicians in the Impressão Digital Studios were desperate when they discovered how Paulinho wanted to record this CD. Rather than laying one track on top of another, Paulinho decided to do what he hadn't done since those early sessions at EMI when he had free use of the studio and could bring ideas and musicians together informally; he opted to record like a live performance. At the request of BMG, Paulinho did not record new material.
Samba e Choro Negro took 4 days to record and is a sort of "live greatest hits." Paulinho's usual ensemble was on board for the date: Celsinho Silva, pandeiro ganzá; César Faria (his father), guitar; Dininho, bass; Cristóvão Bastos, piano; Cabelinho, reco-reco, tamborim, surdo, ganzá; Mestre Marçal, cuíca; Hércules, drums; Amélia Rabello, vocals. These are players who have worked with him for years and know every nuance of his compositions. Fortunately, the singular nature of the project made his concept possible as both the performance and recording quality is exemplary.
Recently Paulinho clarified that his absence from the studio had been a productive time and had nothing to do with an artistic crisis. After recording Eu Canto Samba in 1989, he gave many performances. In São Paulo he shared the stage with Cristóvão Bastos and Joel Nascimento in a spectacular show that was awarded a prize for the best performance of 1995 by the São Paulo Association of Art Critics. He also wrote new works with his old partner Élton Medeiros. But he was plagued by a string of personal disasters: a large tree falling on his home, an armed assault on his wife and children, the flood in January 1996, and the fiasco surrounding the 1995 New Year's Eve show, an instance where both samba and Paulinho were seen as victims.
The New Year's Eve homage to Tom Jobim was a performance for which Caetano Veloso, Chico Buarque, Gal Costa, Gilberto Gil, and Milton Nascimento each received $100,000; Paulinho received $35,000. On January 1, 1996, newspapers and magazines across Brazil focused on the incident, creating misunderstandings and severing friendships. When reports came out that Paulinho had received "a little less" than the other artists, he did not demand equal payment, nor did he discuss the issue with the parties responsible. His only wish was to establish the truth.
The Imposto de Renda (Income Tax) people wanted to know exactly how much he had received, and Paulinho made it clear publicly that he did not receive "a little less." Accounts of a trial to discover exactly what had happened started turning up in press reports and interviews with the different sides and created a tremendous amount of confusion with Paulinho at the center. The other artists became uneasy about the amounts they had received and about how it appeared to their fans. Some of them blamed Paulinho for their anxiety.
Nevertheless, Paulinho's return to the studio was met with unanimous applause by the music world. After all, Paulinho da Viola is a watershed, a musician who can sense a mood more accurately than most, capture it, divine its very essence, and return it to the public in musical form with uncanny emotional expression. The sambista is a unique personality in Brazilian music who has never worried about releasing CD's every two years to keep up the momentum of his career like many of his colleagues. He doesn't promote his recordings with national tours, nor does he encourage inflated ad campaigns prior to a new release. Paulinho da Viola only records when he finds that he has something interesting to say in the form of samba. And this is the reason each of his recordings has become a "classic." Fortunately his record company acquiesces because Bebadosamba stands out from the others as a tribute to the illustrious sambistas of the past.
Sprinkled with new ideas and a variety of recurring themes, Bebadosamba presents a history of pure samba to a new generation just when the richness and variety of the genre seemed to be disappearing. Radical in an era when the market has been dominated by groups that sing ballads in samba rhythm, albeit with less syncopation and with keyboards supplying the harmony, Paulinho holds to the traditional instruments of samba: cavaquinho, violão, cuíca, ganzá, agogô, pandeiro, and tamborim and crafts the kind of samba that was mainstream before the appearance of pagode in the early 1980's, a subtle samba with intricate harmony.
Few can remember the sambistas from the past that continue to inspire Paulinho da Viola. But the title track, "Bebadosamba," offers an evocation, a rhythmic intoning of reverence for some of the immortal ones: Cartola, Candeia (co-founder with Paulinho da Viola of the escola Quilombo), Nélson Cavaquinho, Pixinguinha, and Donga, among others who helped define Brazilian music and Paulinho's peerless sound. It begins with a poetic dialogue between Paulinho and Boca. The lyrics spoken like a lament, almost whispered and without melody give you shivers:
E eu, Boca, como sempre perdido,
Bêbado de samba e outros sonhos
Choro a lágrima comum,
Que todos choram
And I, Boca, as usual lost,
Drunk with samba and other dreams
Cry a common tear
That everyone cries
The opening track, "Quando o Samba Chama" (When the Samba Calls), explains Paulinho's decision to be silent for so long and reveals how he can turn bad luck into fodder for poetry:
Se algum pensamento que vem não seduz
O poeta declina
Daquilo que ele não sente
E o silêncio é o peso que ele conduz.
If some thought that comes doesn't seduce
The poet declines
From that which he does not feel
And the silence is the weight that he bears.
The beautiful "Dama de Espadas" (Queen of Spades), introduced by a piano part reminiscent of French composer Erik Satie, validates Paulinho as one of the rare composers of samba who can innovate without loosing the essential characteristics of the form. To demonstrate the difference between today's samba enredo and the old exaltations to the escolas de samba, Paulinho recorded "O Ideal É Competir" (The Ideal Is to Compete), with the "Old Guard" of the Portela escola furnishing a warmth unusual for a studio session. The ensemble's exemplary performance of "É Difícil Viver Assim" (It's Hard to Live This Way) in the old style of backyard samba etches the tune's refrain and tamborim rhythm into your memory and demands one more listening.
There are also some surprises in the repertoire, like the ethereal "Alento" with the reflective lyrics and music of Paulo César Pinheiro and the partnership of Paulinho and Ferreira Gullar on "Solução de Vida" (Solution in Life), an ideological review of life, full of syncopation and featuring the flawless flute work of Aquarela Carioca's Mário Sève. And the duo of Paulinho and Élton Medeiros, which began more than 30 years ago, is back with "Ame" (Love), a tune offering some good advice and punctuated by a crack horn section guaranteed to have you on your feet.
Recalling a year when the composer was jolted by setbacks, from the episode at the New Year's Eve show to the floods in Rio, there is an excess of tunes having disillusioned and aquatic metaphors like "Mar Grande" (Great Sea) written by Paulinho and Sérgio Natureza; "Timoneiro" (Helmsman) with lyrics by Hermínio Bello de Carvalho; and "Novos Rumos" (New Routes), an old hit by Orlando Porto and Rochinha originally recorded in the 1950's by Sílvio Caldas:
Todos os anos vividos
São portos perdidos
Que eu deixo pra trás
All the years lived
Are lost harbors
That I leave behind
The lyrics and melody of "Mar Grande" confirm how natural it is for Paulinho da Viola to create a timeless sound that is influenced more by his esthetic convictions than by waves that agitate the recording industry. "Mar Grande" is a slow, floating composition co-arranged by Cristóvão Bastos:
Não quero mar de marola
Das praias da moda
Na rebentação
I don't want a calm sea
Folding up on the sand
Of the fashionable beaches
Although it seems the public couldn't care less that the language of samba has become distorted and jeopardized by a growing number of popular artists, it is hard to ignore the return of a musician who for over three decades has eloquently captured the political and social conditions of his time and expanded the limits of samba without disfiguring its essence. Paulinho da Viola has come back to enchant and to demonstrate it is impossible to talk about samba as a form frozen in time.
Ame
Paulinho da Viola and Élton Medeiros
Ame
Seja como for
Sem medo de sofrer
Pintou desilusão
Não tenha medo não
O tempo poderá lhe dizer
Que tudo
Traz alguma dor
E o bem de revelar
Que tal felicidade
Sempre tão fugaz
A gente tem que conquistar
Por que se negar
Com tanto querer
Por que não se dar
Por quê?
Por que recusar
A luz em você
Deixar pra depois
Chorar . . . pra quê?
Love
Love
Whatever it is
Without fear of suffering
If disillusion appears
Don't be afraid
Time will tell you
That everything
Brings pain
And is kind to reveal
That happiness
Is always fleeting
We have to conquer that.
Why do you deny yourself
With so much desire
Why don't you give yourself
Why?
Why do you refuse
The light in you
And leave for tomorrow
Cry . . . What for?
O Ideal É Competir
Candeia and Casquinha
Quando a Portela chegou
A platéia vibrou de emoção
Suas pastoras vaidosas
Defendiam orgulhosas
O seu pavilhão
Portela
A luta é teu ideal
O que se passou, passou
Não te podem deter
Teu destino é lutar e vencer
Oh! minha Portela
Por ti darei minha vida
Oh! Portela querida
És tu quem levas a alegria
Para milhares de fãs
És considerada, sem vaidade,
Na cidade
Como super campeã das campeãs
Eu quisera ter agora
A juventude de outrora
Idade de encantos mil
Pra trilhar contigo passo a passo
No sucesso ou no fracasso
Pela glória do samba do Brasil
The Ideal Is to Compete
When Portela comes
The crowd vibrates with emotion
Your majestic dancers
Proudly defend
Your flag
Portela
Fighting is you ideal
What happens, happens
They cannot detain you
Your destiny is to fight and win
Oh! my Portela
For you I'd give my life
Oh! Portela my dear
You are the one who brings happiness
To millions of fans
You are considerate, without vanity,
In the city
Like a super champion among champions
I would like to have now
The youth of other times
Age of a thousand enchantments
To march with you step by step
In your success or your failure
For the glory of samba of Brazil
Novos Rumos
Rochinha and Orlando Porto
Vou imprimir novos rumos
Ao barco agitado
Que foi minha vida
Fiz minhas velas ao mar
Disse adeus sem chorar
E estou de partida
Todo os anos vividos
São portos perdidos
Que eu deixo pra trás
Quero viver diferente
Que a sorte da gente
É a gente que faz
Quando a vida nos cansa
E se perde a esperança
O melhor é partir
Ir procurar outros mares
Onde outros olhares
Nos façam sorrir
Levo no meu coração
Uma grande lição
Que contigo aprendi
Tu me ensinaste em verdade
Que a felicidade
Está longe de ti
New Routes
I'm going to chart new routes
For the rocking ship
That was my life
I raised my sails on the sea
I said good by without crying
And I am leaving
All the years lived
Are lost harbors
That I leave behind
I want to live differently
Our destiny
Is what we do
When we are tired of living
We loose hope
It is better to leave
And look for new seas
Where other sights
Make us smile
I take into my heart
A great lesson
That I learned with you
You taught me the truth
That happiness
Is far from you
Alento
Paulo César Pinheiro
Violão esquecido num canto é silêncio
Coração encolhido no peito é desprezo
Solidão hospedada no leito é ausência
A paixão refletida num pranto, ai, é tristeza
Um olhar espiando o vazio é lembrança
Um desejo trazido no vento é saudade
Um desvio na curva do tempo é distância
E um poeta que acaba vadio, ai, é destino
A vida da gente é mistério
A estrada do tempo é segredo
O sonho perdido é espelho
O alento de tudo é canção
O fio do enredo é mentira
A história do mundo é brinquedo
O verso do samba é conselho
E tudo o que eu disse é ilusão
Comfort
A guitar forgotten in a corner is silence
A shrunken heart in my chest is disdain
Solitude housed in a bed is absence
Passion reflected in a single tear, ah, this is sadness
Staring at the emptiness is remembering
A wish brought on the wind is longing
A detour in the curve of time is distance
And a poet that is lazy, ah, is destiny
Our life is a mystery
The road of time is a secrete
The dream lost is a mirror
The comfort of everything is song
The thread of the plot is a lie
The history of the world is a toy
The verse of a samba is advice
And everything that I said is an illusion
1996 Bebadosamba BMG
1996 Geração Samba WEA (a compilation)
1993 Samba E Choro Negro World Network
1989 Eu Canto Samba RCA
1983 Prisma Luminoso WEA
1982 A Toda Hora Rola uma Estória WEA
1981 Paulinho da Viola WEA
1979 Zumbido EMI
1978 Paulinho da Viola EMI
1976 Memórias Chorando EMI
1976 Memórias Cantando EMI
1975 Amor à Natureza EMI
1973 Nervos de Aço EMI
1972 Dança da Solidão EMI
1971 Paulinho da Viola EMI
1971 Paulinho da Viola EMI
(same year and title but different tracks)
1970 Foi um Rio que Passou em Minha Vida EMI
1968 Paulinho da Viola EMI
1968 Samba na Madrugada RGE
1967 Roda de Samba vol.3 RCA
1966 Roda de Samba vol.2 Musidisc
1965 Roda de Samba Musidisc
Bruce Gilman plays cuíca for Mocidade Independente Los Angeles, received his MA from California Institute of the Arts, and teaches English and ESL in Long Beach, California. You can reach him through his E-mail: cuica@interworld.net