Revaluation of samba in Chico Buarque`s critic song

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Revaluation of samba in Chico Buarque’s critic song
Sabrina Lastman
Rubin Academy of Music (Jerusalem)
Samba music, in the song creation of Brazilian composer Chico Buarque, becomes a
revalued genre and a critical tool to express social and political ideas through a renewal on
its lyrical style. The song Apesar de Vocé studied in this paper was in 1970 Brazilian
dictatorship a symbol of liberation. This paper brings up the composer’s redefinition of the
genre.
This work intends to relate the musical and lyrical frames in the work of
Chico Buarque. We give importance to revaluation of samba genre in Buarque’s
creation through poetry, taking in account the socio-political context of 1960’s and
1970’s in Brazil (more specifically in the city of Rio de Janeiro) under the
oppression of military dictatorship. Buarque creates a fusion between popular
culture and cult poetry, element that I will associate to the creation of sacred spaces.
We will take as an analysis example the song Apesar de Vocé [In Spite of You
(1970)] to be in my opinion, one of the songs that contains –into samba genre– a
mayor grade of social and political critic, framed in historical time.
Hegemony – Counter-hegemony
During the first government period of General Getulio Vargas (1930-1937),
and during his militar dictatorship (1937-1945, called Estado Novo [New State]) the
development of samba as a unifying element of Brazilian culture had a big
importance.1 Samba is a dance and musical genre. Musically is a responsorial
singing that has cultivated the call-and-response performing style, and percussive
1
There is no necessity to look for other cause respecting the tolerance and benevolence Rio’s
municipality showed to samba schools (escolas de samba)... Documents and testimonies prove that had
been many transactions among samba schools founders and politicians... In exchange of their votes on
elections, an Escola could obtain certain privileges or benefits. (Pereira de Queiroz 19)
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interplay, the batucada.2 “Technically, samba has a 2/4 meter, an emphasis on the
second beat, a stanza-and-refrain alternation structure, and many interlocking,
syncopated lines in the melody and accompaniment.” (McGowan and Pessanha, The
Brazilian 23) From being a non-canonical expression, of marginal sectors and
working classes, samba becomes the representation of Brazil.3 It transforms in a
product of commercialization and exportation, and a product of national identity
unification.4 In consequence, samba symbolizes the Brazilian stereotype in Europe
as well as in the United States.
At the beginning, the expansion of samba schools5 represented the re-establishment of
oppressed classes by the hegemonic groups… The prohibition of any critic, politic and
socioeconomic claim during parades, was one of the ways to prevent a possible
collective awareness of the suburbs. (Pereira de Queiroz 27)
Following Pereira de Queiroz, all content expressed at carnival processions had to
be limited to themes that were not related with social critic. Therefore the song
texts, in general, point the attention to themes about daily life, love, carnival and
patriotism. The lyrics of the song Aquarela do Brasil [Brazil’s Watercolor (1939)]
of composer Ary Barroso, belongs to the Estado Novo [New State] epoch. To
Meneses (174) it is the language of a situation, where the popular song is
instrumented to promote the doctrinarian ideology of the State, becoming an ironic
language. Perrone and Dunn (Brazilian Popular 14) points that “this piece -a subgenre of samba exaltação [samba exaltation]- is characterized lyrically by romantic
patriotism and musically by long involved melodies and arrangements keeping the
North American big-band sound.”
Aquarela do Brasil [Brazil’s Watercolor]:
Brazil, Brazil
For me, for me
Oh! These murmuring fountains
2
“Batucada: Popular reunion, generally, in the streets, where samba is played in percussion instruments,
with or without vocal accompaniment.” (Buarque de Holanda 89)
3
Samba is one among a vast quantity of musical styles, depending on the geographical area.
4
The origin and development of samba schools between 1930 and 1950 coincided with a period of
important economical changes for Brazil: three constitutions (1933, 1937, 1947); a rising number of
elector population, with change of majority of age to 18 year-old and the right of vote to women (1933);
the development of industrialization that appeared during World War II, that affected the two biggest
cities from the south, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The industrialization brought the expansion of
favelas and suburbs. (Pereira de Queiroz 19)
5
The note is not in the original, but is written for better understanding. “Escolas de Samba: The
recreational clubs in Rio de Janeiro (and other cities) that organize elaborate participation in carnival
parades, usually from shantytowns (favelas) or other lower-class areas.” (Perrone, Masters of 226)
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Where I quench my thirst
And where the moon comes to play
Oh! This brown and beautiful Brazil
You are my Brazilian Brazil
Land of Samba and tambourines
Brazil, Brazil, for me, for me6
During the history of samba we can find examples of artists that have
expressed through this musical genre their ideas and opinions about social reality.
McGowan and Pessanha (The Brazilian 33) give us some examples. In the 1950’s
Zé Keti (José Flores de Jesús), one of the great samba de morro7 figures denounced
the sad poverty in the favelas8, “the poverty in which the majority of Brazilians
seemed doomed to live and lamented the fact that so many died needlessly.” The
song named Acender as Velas [Light the Candles] is a good example:
When there’s no samba
There’s disillusion
It’s one more heart
That stopped beating
One more angel that goes to heaven
My God forgive me
But I’ll say it
The doctor arrived too late
Because on the hill
There are no cars to drive
No telephones to call
No beauty to be seen
And we die without wanting to die9
Paulinho da Viola composed in the 1960’s Sinal Fechado [Red Light], “a metaphor
for that closed dark dictatorship era.” (McGowan and Pessanha, The Brazilian 47)
“Sinal Fechado” was recorded by Buarque in the albums Sinal Fechado [Red Light
(1974)], and Chico Buarque & Maria Bethânia Ao Vivo [Chico Buarque & Maria
Bethânia Live (1975)].
Brazilian historian Marcos Napolitano (“Review on Wander” 262) indicates
the “semi-official” historiography of Brazilian music is related to the left
nationalism of 1960 that appropriates the samba as a national symbol, as a tentative
6
English lyrics translation by McGowan and Pessanha, The Brazilian 30.
“Samba de morro: name used by Brazilian media in 1940’s and 1950’s to characterize samba that kept
essential characteristics of style developed by Estácio composers such as Ismael Silva and Bide, and to
differentiate this style from samba-canção (samba song).” (McGowan and Pessanha, The Brazilian 2112)
8
Favelas: poor neighborhoods formed in the ‘morros’ [hills] of Rio de Janeiro. The term has been
extended to nominate poor neighborhoods in general.
9
English lyrics translation by McGowan and Pessanha, The Brazilian 33.
7
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to turn it the counter-hegemonic center of mass culture. Buarque, in my opinion,
uses a new poetic and critic language in a musical genre already known and spread
in Brazil: samba.10
Changes in Brazilian Popular Music (Música Popular Brasileira MPB)
Napolitano (Seguindo a canção 23-4), alludes that Brazilian Popular Music
(MPB) arrived at the end of 1950’s to a consolidated tradition: it had an important
consecrated group of artists; it was remarked for the opening to renovation –taking
in account the materials, parameters and conventional music styles received from
the past generations–; and it had a strong presence in the market. The arrival of
bossa nova –at the end of the 50´s– alludes Paiano, inaugurates a new cycle of
institutionalization in Brazilian music, where the concept of “popular” is being
modified.
...the historical process of socio-cultural redefinition of MPB lead to its
institutionalization, fluctuating between the configuration of a culture of protest and
resistance, and the consolidation of a product highly valuable (from the economical
and the socio-cultural point of view). (Napolitano, Seguindo a canção 23)
With bossa nova [new wave or new beat], a bridge between classical music
and popular music -composed until 1959- is created, generating the redefinition of
“popular”. The intellectuals are the creators and listeners of these music-poetic
compositions. A renewal in the aspects of harmony, melody, arrangements,
instrumentation, and poetry quality is produced. We talk about a renovation in the
sound world itself, referring to words as well as the combination of notes. In his
book Seven Faces Perrone (91-92, 97) writes about the Brazilian poetry and how the
text of songs since the sixties can be seen as poetry. “Complex wordplay and
constructs were common. Subtlety of phrase, ambiguity, metaphor, and allegory
were part of an effort to enhance the level of song, which was encouraged by
historical conditions. The poetry of song changes the channel of communication and
helps to establish a literary ambience in the musical context.” For Perrone, the word
samba “takes on multiple meanings in a series of compositions, signifying -in
addition to the typical Brazilian rhythm, music, and dance- song itself, the plenitude
of experience, or the material or object of poetry.”
10
Samba in Vargas era was a builder of Brazilian national identity and it continues its role during the
dictatorship of the 60’s with General Emilio Médici (1969-1974).
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The artist
Chico Buarque composer, singer and writer was born in Rio de Janeiro, in
June 19, 1944. He is the son of historian Sérgio Buarque de Holanda, important
intellectual figure in Brazil. Since 1946 Chico Buarque lives with his familiy in the
city of São Paulo, and between 1952 and 1960 lives in Italy. Perrone (Masters of 2)
comments that in his coming back , Buarque’s family house it transformed in a
center of reunion: are visiting Vinicius de Moraes and other central figures of the
Bossa Nova. Before entering University, Buarque had read already Tolstoi, Kafka,
Dostoievski, Mário de Andrade, Machado de Assis, José Lins do Rego, Garciliano
Ramos and Guimarães Rosa. He was a radio listener, and he knew to sing
everything he listened, mainly, carnival music. He liked to imitate the styles of Paul
Anka and Elvis Presley, and adored Jacques Brel’s music. When he decided to learn
guitar his sister Miúcha was his teacher. In 1963 Buarque is accepted in the
University of Architecture and Urbanism of São Paulo. Chediak (10-11) raises
Buarque’s participation in the student union, and when in 1964 it was closed, he
decides to abandon university.
Between the artists that had influenced Buarque, we can find Vinicius de
Moraes with his poetical style, Antonio Carlos Jobim with his deep knowledge of
music, and João Gilberto with his guitar playing and voice emission style. Buarque
also absorbed the work of samba composers from the Velha Guardia [Old Guard]:
Noel Rosa, Pixinguinha and Sinhô, between others. Perrone states (Masters of 1-2),
the initial production of Buarque reveals between 1965 and 1968 a concept of
musical construction as a “magical or mythical enterprise”, showing “the beginning
of a sophisticated discourse of social criticism.”
The relation text-music in Buarque. Creation of a sacred space
Among the vast repertoire of songs that could be included under the category
of this work are: Samba de Orly [Orly’s Samba (1971)] composed together with
Vinicius de Moraes and Toquinho, Quando o Carnaval Chegar [When Carnival
Comes (1972)], Meu Caro Amigo [My Dear Friend (1978)] composed with Francis
Hime, Opera do Malandro [Hustler’s Opera (1979)], and Bye Bye Brasil [Bye Bye
Brazil (1979)] composed with Roberto Menescal. Songs of social criticism and
reflection concerning repression and different personal situations in the context of
the dictatorship during the period 1960 and 1970, can be listen-read in other Chico
Buarque’s songs, composed in other musical genres, not being an example for this
specific paper. I recommend: Construção [Construction (1971)], Deus lhe Pague
[May God pay you back (1971)], Cálice [Chalice (1973)] with Gilberto Gil, and O
que Será [What will it be (1976)], among others.
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In Chico Buarque –writes Butterman (86)– we see the extraordinary well
done synthesis of cult poem and popular music in the creation of protest song.
McGowan and Pessanha (The Brazilian Sound 85) write: “Vinicius de Moraes, one
of the Buarque’s greatest fans, said that Chico is a phenomenon who accomplished
the perfect union of both cultivated and popular culture.”
I think that an observation to the vocal emission style used by Buarque, can
contribute to the comprehension to the relation poetry-music, and that is also a
characteristic of popular music.
In popular song the vocal range used is in most cases minor than in erudite song, and
mainly in Opera. Besides that word is an instrument of music realization for the singer,
it is fundamental the attribute of intelligibility of the text as well as of rhythmic and
sound exploration of each word, being inadmissible any adulteration of language
sonority for reasons of technical facilities for musical execution. (Machado 2)
Since bossa nova appeared in 1959, samba –as extrovert style, cooperative and of
big groups– is transformed into a style that can be interpreted in a more intimate
manner. All percussion instruments –batucada– are redesign for the drum set,
creating the possibility of taking the music from the streets (expansion space) to
more reduced physical spaces (intimate space). An example is the Antonio Carlos
Jobim “Samba de uma nota só” [One Note Samba] sang by João Gilberto in the
album O amor, o sorriso e a flor [The love, the smile and the flower (1960)]. When
Buarque sings, he uses the same vocal emission style as Gilberto does, even in
songs of big emotive intensity as Construção [Construction] or Dios lhe Pague
[May God pay you back]. Buarque builds emotional intensity with other tools as
musical arrangements, instrumentation, use of other voices (choir) and the form of
the piece itself. Is the text which gives form to musical structure or is musical
structure which gives form to text?
In music intended to accompany words, Fischer (224) states that “the
‘content’ comes more or less by the text, however a music of this kind can move
from the text or it can dominate it, or it can produce a particular powerful and
notable effect, opposing itself to the text in stead of emphasizing it.” In Buarque’s
critic song, composed in samba genre, music neither moves away from the text nor
dominates the text. His music gives strength to the text and vice versa. There is no
contradiction between music and text. On the contrary, I think that in Buarque’s
music the text brings a new significance and revaluation to the music. Fischer (225)
introduces an idea of composer Hanns Eisler:
…of certain rhythms, tonal sequences, and sound images emerge “automatic
associations”. Even today, a big part of the effect produced by music comes from
“automatic associations” of this kind (military marches, funeral marches, dance
rhythms, etc.), offering the possibility of direct participation even to the non educated
listeners. This power of music to produce collective emotions, to emotionally equalize
people during a certain period of time, it has been particularly useful to military and
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religious organizations. Among all arts, music is the most suitable to cloud
intelligence, to delight, to create an ecstatic conscience, and even to make death
willingly acceptable.
Buarque uses this power of music “to produce collective emotions, to emotionally
equalize people during a certain period of time” (Eisler), no for the goal of dictators
as Vargas or Médici. He transmits with samba the opposite collective goal. Is
through samba that Buarque creates a liberated frame to express contrary opinions
to the ones of the regime. What others do not allow themselves to communicate, he
does it in a poem. Buarque talks to the ‘power’ that wants to homogenize people’s
opinion in a repressive reality that occurs in that historical moment. In this way, he
opens to samba11 a door of ideas and opinions that had never been allowed to
express in the escolas de samba at carnival processions, for fear to sanctions or
disqualifications. Other composers perhaps had not given themselves the freedom to
do it.
When in 1970 the dictatorship becomes more aggressive in its politic of
oppression, we can observe in Buarque a social awareness. These are some
impressions about what was happening in Brazil –more specifically in Rio de
Janeiro- when he returns from the exile in Italy:
I got to understand what was going on when I came back here in 1970. It was heavy
weight, right before the World Cup. It was very frightening to arrive here and to find a
reality that I didn’t imagine. Having been away for a year and a half, I could now see
the changes. Those cars with stickers saying ‘Brazil, love it or leave it’, or even ‘love
it or die’ on the back windows. But I didn’t have another chance. I knew that it was the
new picture, even if I have a different opinion. ‘Very well, it is here where I’m going
to live’. I was really back here to stay. Then, I wrote In Spite of You. (Buarque,
“Entrevista a O Globo” )
Meneses (36-37) states that time in Buarque’s songs carries a transformation, taking
an historical dimension, disappearing the “mythical time.”12 From a distance of
historical reality, lyricism and nostalgia of the past, he starts to intensify his social
critic, and to think in “tomorrow”, in what will come, he start to have a perspective
of the future. “We can see that the utopian world of Buarque read between the lines,
is a rejection to unsatisfactory daily life”. (Butterman 87)
According to Sant’Anna “his music makes to talk what daily life silences.”
For Butterman (88) Buarque’s music goes beyond, making a coming back to reality
more bearable. This Butterman’s expression lead me to relate re-signification of
samba genre through Buarque’s poetry, with the notion of sacred space-time of
Eliade. Sacred and profane constitutes for Eliade (18-20), two modalities of being in
11
I relate samba with joy, celebration and carnival. With its Afro-Brazilian origin and its birth and
development in the favelas and suburbs of Rio de Janeiro.
12
More information about the subject can be found in Eliade, chapter II.
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the world, coexisting in modern world. The manifestation of sacred –hierophany–
becomes visible to the human being as something completely different from
profane. “When manifesting the sacred, an object of any kind is transformed in
something else, and without letting to be itself it continues to participate in the
surrounding cosmic medium.” (Eliade, Lo Sagrado 19) To whom this object is
revealed as sacred, his immediate reality is transformed in a supernatural reality. It
can be said that in the context of dictatorship, where freedom of opinion was
forbidden, the song Apesar de Vocé can functions as a “sacred object”. For those not
sharing the militarized vision of the world, the song shows another reality. It
provokes a strong catharsis, a liberating tension process, being possible to think it as
a sacred space-time. Is when the person listens –at home, at the job, in a more
individual space-time– or goes to a concert –where a shared space-time is lived as a
collective ritual– when the person is moved to another reality, to a more desire
existence, to a “supernatural reality”. Profane reality, not sacred because of
repression, it is represented in the army and its attitude. The chaos of daily life, the
disintegration of the human being, is reverted by the hierophany through the song.
The song is the symbol of coming back to life through the power of words (poetry)
and music (samba).
Analyzing the song
In this part of the work I will analyze the relation between text and music in
the song Apesar de Vocé. It will be possible to see more directly the idea of sacred
space-time and the song as a “liberating symbol” in the historical context lived in
those years. Meneses (37) points that with this song, born in the hardest period of
repression under military dictatorship, Buarque faced censorship of General Médici,
becoming Apesar de Você a prohibited song.
Choral introduction
Amanhã vai ser outro dia
Amanhã vai ser outro dia
Tomorrow will be another day
Tomorrow will be another day
A1
Hoje você é quem manda
Falou, tá falado
Não tem discussão Não
Today you are the one who rules
What you say is a fact
There is no discussion no
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A minha gente hoje anda
Falando de lado
E olhando pro chão, viu
Você que inventou esse estado
E inventou de inventar
Toda a escuridão
Você que inventou o pecado
Esqueceuse de inventar
O perdão
Today we are
Talking secretly
And looking at the floor, see
You who invented that state
And invented to invent
All obscurity
You who invented sin
Forgot to invent
forgiveness
B1
Apesar de você
Amanhã há de ser
Outro dia
Eu pergunto a você
Onde vai se esconder
Da enorme euforia
Como vai proibir
Quando o galo insistir
Em cantar
Água nova brotando
E a gente se amando
Sem parar
In spite of you
Tomorrow will be
Another day
I ask you
Where are you going to hide
The enormous euphoria
How are you going to forbid
Once the cock insist
on keep singing
New waters spring
And we love each other
Without ending
A2
Quando chegar o momento
Esse meu sofrimento
Vou cobrar com juros, juro
Todo esse amor reprimido
Esse grito contido
Este samba no escuro
Você que inventou a tristeza
Ora, tenha a fineza
De desinventar
Você vai pagar e é dobrado
Cada lágrima rolada
Nesse meu penar
When the time comes
I’ll charge you with my suffering
cursing, I swear
All that love repressed
That contained shout
This samba in the darkness
You, the one who invented sadness
Now, be so kind
To un-invent it
You are going to pay twice
Each wept tear
in my pain
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B2
Apesar de você
Amanhã há de ser
Outro dia
Inda pago pra ver
O jardim florescer
Qual você não queria
Você vai se amargar
Vendo o dia raiar
Sem lhe pedir licença
E eu vou morrer de rir
Que esse dia há de vir
Antes do que você pensa
In spite of you
Tomorrow will be
Another day
I’m already paying to see
The garden flourishing
the way you did not want to
You will become embittered
Looking the day rising
Without asking you for permission
And I will laugh ‘til death
That day will come
Sooner than you think
B3
Apesar de você
Amanhã há de ser
Outro dia
Você vai ter que ver
A manhã renascer
E esbanjar poesia
Como vai se explicar
Vendo o céu clarear
De repente, impunemente
Como vai abafar
Nosso coro a cantar
Na sua frente
In spite of you
Tomorrow will be
Another day
You will have to see
The morning born again
And squander poetry
How are you going to explain yourself
The sky is suddenly clearing,
Without punishment
How are you going to stop
Our choir when singing
In front of you
B4
Apesar de você
Amanhã há de ser
Outro dia
Você vai se dar mal
Etecetera e tal
la lai a la lai a la...13
In spite of you
Tomorrow will be
Another day
You are going to harm yourself
Etc. and such
la lai a la lai a la...
The song is composed in D Major. Its structure contains a choral introduction
of eight bars, entering then to the form A1, B1, A2, B2, B3, and B4. The
introduction of the choir in unison is heard as faraway in space, getting closer when
13
Song text from Chediak 60-64.
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the second phrase “Amanhã vai ser outro dia” [Tomorrow will be another day] is
sung. The auditory perception is similar to the one of the escola de samba when is
heard coming in the distance, getting closer, and passing nearby. The sensation of
the introduction (eight bars) is that the song is here to stay with the listener (the
volume of the song makes us perceive its corporal proximity). When the sound of
the band is near, the listener is being part of a liberating ritual.
It is interesting to see that each part or section (A1, B1, A2, B2, B3 and B4)
contains four stanzas of three verses each one, and each stanza lasts eight bars,
containing from the point of view of the text, a clear idea. It means, each part from
the textual (poetry) and musical (melody and chord progressions) point of view
expresses four sentences-ideas.
The poetic self starts the text (A1 section) relating to a second person “Você”
[You], directly to the repressor (General Emilio Médici). “Hoje você é quem
manda” [Today you are the one who rules], it provides a context for historical time,
“Hoje”, in the current present, today. In second stanza of A1 part, “A minha gente
hoje anda / Falando de lado / E olhando pro chão, viu” [Today we are / Talking
secretly / And looking at the floor, see], as well as in second stanza of A2 part,
“Todo esse amor reprimido / Esse grito contido / Este samba no escuro” [All that
love repressed / That contained shout / This samba in the darkness], the text
expresses the repression state of emotions by civil society.
In sections A1, third stanza, Buarque brings up the creation of profane spacetime by military repression: “Você que inventou esse estado / E inventou de inventar
/ Toda a escuridão” [You who invented that state / And invented to invent / All
obscurity]. That obscurity represents the chaos lived by the people. Eliade writes
that profane is related to chaos, to the unknown. In this new “estado” [state] or
situation, the lyric self –as spokesperson of the Brazilian population against the
military regime- it does not feel a part of that “unknown territory”, of that “cosmos”,
of that new universe.
In fourth stanza of same section “Você que inventou o pecado” [You who
invented sin], it shows that in this new state only sin has been created. There is no
redemption, no existence for forgiveness or another possibility for the one who see
the world with different eyes. In the other hand, it is present the radical alteration of
that contained perspective in “Amanhã”, tomorrow (B sections). Musically we can
perceived that in the use of mayor tonality D Major. The opposite occurs when
listening to A sections, where the song starts with the minor relative tonality B
minor, leaving in the listener a feeling of melancholy.14
In B sections, opening with “Apesar de você / Amanhã há de ser / Outro dia”
14
In the song Samba da Benção [Blessing‘s Samba] with music by Baden Powell and lyrics by Vinicius
de Moraes, Moraes writes: Mas pra fazer um samba com beleza, / É preciso um bocado de tristeza /
Preciso um bocado de tristeza, / Se não não se faz samba não [But to make a samba with beauty, / it is
necessary a little bit of sadness, / It is necessary a little bit of sadness, / Otherwise no samba is done].
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[In spite of you / Tomorrow will be / Another day], we oversee what it will be life
and its transformation in a no faraway future.15 B1 section demonstrates it in phrases
“…enorme euphoria” [enormous euphoria], “…galo cantar” [rooster singing],
“Água nova brotando” [New waters spring], “…gente se amando” [we love each
other]; B2 section in “…jardim florescer” [garden flourishing], “…dia raiar” [day
rising]; and B3 section in “…manhã renascer” [morning born again], “…esbanjar
poesia” [squander poetry], “…céu clarear” [sky clearing] and “coro a cantar” [choir
singing].
The poem structure settles on a free game of antithesis that happens between
today and tomorrow as Meneses (76-78) demonstrates it:
Hoje (Today)
Amanhã (Tomorrow)
gente falando de lado
grito contido
escuridão
amor reprimido
lágrima rolada
pecado
samba no escuro
tristeza
penar
sofrimento
coro a cantar
enorme euforia
céu clarear
a gente se amando sem parar
rir
agua nova brotando
dia raiar
manhã renascer
galo a cantar
jardim florescer
Under the signifier “Hoje” [Today] in one side, are the retention forces, block of
vital expansion, the forces of control and imprisoned energy: the semantic of death.
Under the signifier “Amanhã” [Tomorrow] lies the expansive pulsations of energy
and fecundity: the metaphor of life. This opposition diagram shows a constant threat
to the repressive entity that is revealed from the beginning of the text, and which
suffers a series of changes:
In B1 Part
Eu pergunto a você
Onde vai se esconder
Da enorme euforia
...
I ask you
Where are you going to hide
The enormous euphoria
In A2 Part
Esse meu sofrimento
Vou cobrar com juros, juro
I’ll charge you with my suffering
cursing, I swear
15
It can be seen in the text, at the end of B2 part where it is written “Que esse dia há de vir / Antes do que
você pensa” [That day will come / Sooner than you think].
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...
Você vai pagar e é dobrado
…
You are going to pay
In B2 Part
Você vai se amargar
…
You’ll become embittered
In B4 Part
Você vai se dar mal
…
You are going to harm yourself
The lyric self foresees/anticipates, from an omnipotent situation of the
repressor “Você” [You], a gradual process that will lead the dictator to experience
the pain lived “Hoje” [Today] for those who are opposite to the regime. Is the vision
of a desired future, and this future is reinforced by the times B parts are repeated.
Sections B2, B3 and B4 are consecutively sung, as the repetition could be a way of
transforming the reality. Tension in the content of the text increases. Buarque in
stead of continuing with words, uses in second stanza of B4 part, the verse
“Etecetera e tal” [Etc. and such], and finishes the other stanzas with the word la-lala.
The relation between poetry world and musical world in the song Apesar de
Você, is thought as the product of the encounter between popular and cult. Under
this socio-historical condition, the song brings a perspective of the actual situation –
profane space-time–, using minor tonality as opposed to the reality that will come.
Tomorrow is expressed through mayor tonality, it will make pay the dictator his
debts with the people, and it will lead to self liberation.
To a conclusion
I argue that samba is revalued through Buarque’s capacity of being an artisan
of language, knowing to manage rhythm, rhyme, sound effects, using a coherent
lexical selection and structuring the text complemented by functional imagery and
symbols. Samba is also revalued by Buarque’s creation of a sacred space-time,
bringing people to a different state after listening to the song. In this specific
political-historical context, coming back to reality can regenerate, for the one who
listens to the song, the daily reality. The listener is being liberated through the
symbolic power of samba music and refined poetry.
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Discography
Buarque, Chico. Chico Buarque. Coleção Millenium, Segunda Parte. São Paulo:
PolyGram, 1998.
Gilberto, João. Desafinado. Italy: Saludos Amigos CD62024, 1992.
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Music from the Motion Picture. Woman on Top. Austria: Sony Music, 2000.
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Toquinho and Vinicius de Moraes. Toquinho e Vinicius. O Poeta e o violão. Milano:
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Veloso, Caetano and Chico Buarque. Caetano e Chico Juntos e ao Vivo. Brasil:
1972.
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