Samba is one of the most famous of the various forms of music arising from African roots in Brazil. The name samba most probably comes from the Angolan semba (mesemba), a religious rhythm.

 Samba is one of the most famous of the various forms of music arising from African roots in Brazil. The name samba most probably comes from the Angolan semba (mesemba), a religious rhythm.

History Samba developed as a distinctive kind of music at the beginning of the 20th century in Rio de Janeiro (then the capital of Brazil) under the strong influence of immigrant black people from Bahia. The title "samba school" ("escola de samba") originates from samba's formative years. The term was adopted by larger groups of samba performers in an attempt to lend acceptance of samba and its performance; local campuses were often the practice/performance grounds for these musicians and "escola" gave early performers a sense of legitimacy and organization to offset samba's somewhat controversial social atmosphere.

"Pelo Telefone" (1917), by Donga and Mauro Almeida, is generally considered the first samba recording. Its great success carried the new genre outside the black ghettos. Who created the music is uncertain, but it was most probably the work of the group around Tia Ciata, among them Pixinguinha and Jo?o da Bahiana.

In the 1930s, a group of musicians led by Ismael Silva founded in the neighbourhood of Est?cio de S? the first Samba School, Deixa Falar. They transformed the musical genre to make it fit better the carnival parade. In this decade, the radio spread the genre's popularity all around the country, and with the support of the nationalist dictatorship of Get?lio Vargas, samba became Brazil's "official music".

In the following years, samba has developed in several directions, from the gentle samba-cancao to the drum orchestras which make the soundtrack of carnival parade. One of these new styles was the bossa nova, made by middle class white people. It got increasingly popular over time, with the works of Jo?o Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim.

In the sixties, Brazil was politically divided, and the leftist musicians of bossa nova started to gather attention to the music made in the favelas. Many popular artists were discovered at this time. Names like Cartola, Nelson Cavaquinho, Velha Guarda da Portela, Ze Keti, and Clementina de Jesus recorded their first albums.

In the seventies, the samba got back to radios air waves. Composers and singers like Martinho da Vila, Clara Nunes and Beth Carvalho dominated the hit parade. In the beginning of the eighties, after having been sent to the underground due to styles like disco and Brazilian rock, Samba reappeared in the media with a musical movement created in the suburbs of Rio de Janeiro. It was the pagode, a renewed samba, with new instruments, like the banjo and the tantan, and a new language, more popular, filled with slangs. The most popular names were Zeca Pagodinho, Almir Guineto, Grupo Fundo de Quintal, Jorge Aragao, and Jovelina Perola Negra.

Nowadays, samba is still one of the most popular musical genres in Brazil. Samba-enredo A samba-enredo is a song performed by a samba school in Rio de Janeiro during its yearly Carnival parade. The term also refers to particular style of samba music typical of such songs. Samba-enredo is well known internationally due to Rio de Janeiro's longstanding status as a major tourist destination during Carnival and to the fact that many percussion groups have formed around the world inspired by this type of samba.

Sambas-enredo are recorded and played on the radio during the period leading up to Carnival. They are generally perfomed by male vocalists accompanied by cavaquinho and a large bater?a (percussion group) producing a dense, complex texture known as samba batucada. They heavily emphasize the second count of the measure driven by the bass notes of the surdo drums.

Rio de Janeiro's bater?as have provided inspiration for the formation of percussion groups around the world, especially in Western countries. These groups generally do not use vocals or cavaquinho, focusing instead on percussion grooves and numerous breaks. This type of samba is known as samba de breque. These groups operate year round, unlike in Brazil where activity is confined to the months preceding Carnival.

Wikipedia information about Samba This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Samba (dance)". More from Wikipedia