|
|
The 2003 carnival of Salvador, Bahia was officially proclaimed the "carnival of the baianas" in honor of the Bahian women who make and sell acarajé, the fried bean cakes that originated in West Africa that today constitute Bahia's most famous and beloved street food. The baianas are today celebrated symbols of local culture, frequently appearing in brochures and advertisements beckoning domestic and international tourists to visit a terra da felicidade, or "land of happiness." The white-haired patriarch of Bahian politics, Antônio Carlos Magalhães, known here as ACM, never misses a photo op with the baianas donning their white embroidered skirts, petticoats, and head wraps. In many ways, they are the premier symbol of baianidade or "Bahianness", a discourse of regional identity that associates Bahia with pleasure, sensuality, social harmony, and conciliation in a city characterized by marked social and racial inequalities.
For many, however, carnival 2003 will be remembered as the carnaval do grampo, or the "carnival of wire-tapping" as it coincided with a massive political scandal involving ACM who has been accused of illegally tapping the conversations of everyone from political rivals to his ex-girlfriend and her husband. Throughout carnival, the city's largest newspaper, A Tarde, was relentless in its coverage of the unfolding scandal involving a large network of the senator's friends and political associates. On Saturday of carnival, for example, the headline of A Tarde had nothing to do with the spectacular parades of the day before. Instead, it announced "Wire-tapping even of women who had separated from their husbands." For the first time in years, the senator did not make any public appearances in carnival, having quietly retreated to the distant beach town of Porto Seguro at the insistence of his political allies who feared too much media exposure.
For many Bahians, ACM's trouble were emblematic of the decadence of carnival practices that took form and expanded during the apogee of his political power in the 1990s. This is the carnival of the large blocos de trio, well-sponsored, lucrative organizations that contract dance bands to perform on a trio elétrico, a massive moving soundstage that has been an enduring symbol of the carnival of Salvador since the 1950s. Revelers pay hefty sums to parade with these blocos, which provide them with a carnival costume and protection behind a cordon that moves with the trio. Large blocos employ hundreds of poorly paid workers called cordeiros to secure the cordon that separates paying customers from revelers on the outside. For years, Bahians and visitors alike have denounced the cordons, which tend to dramatize and reinforce social and racial divisions within the city. In Caetano Veloso's 1969 homage to the vehicle, "Atrás do trio elétrico", he sang "Átrás do trio elétrico só não vai quem já morreu" [Behind the trio elétrico only the dead don't follow.] In the 1990s critics parodied the song with the wry observation that "Atrás do trio elétrico só vai quem já pagou" [Behind the trio elétrico only those who have paid can follow]. Five years ago there were 340 thousand revelers who paid to participate in blocos, while this year there were only 185 thousand. Many of these revelers migrated to the camarotes, luxurious private suites along a beachfront parade route through the neighborhoods of Barra and Ondina. The camarotes sprang up in the 1990s, often occupying public space on the sidewalks leading some critics to speak of the "privatization" of the Bahian carnival. Many of these camarotes are sponsored by top Bahian artists. Gilberto Gil' camarote, housed in an elegant art deco apartment building in front of the Barra Lighthouse, offered guests a banquet of catered food, a team of massage therapists, a hair salon, and a dance floor. Carlinhos Brown introduced th camarote andante, a sort of moving VIP suite with an elegant bar that accompanied his bloco Timbalada.
Over the last few years there has been a gradual move away from a parade infrastructure based on cordoned blocos in order to return to the democratic and dionyisian roots of the trio elétrico. Two major examples of this trend were thetrios indepedentes of Gilberto Gil, the great tropicalist singer-songwriter who was recently appointed Minister of Culture in the Lula government, and Daniela Mercury, one of the great divas of Bahian pop music since the early 1990s. Gil's trio Expresso 2222 featured a wide variety of guest artists, including his old friend Caetano Veloso, Bahian guitar wizard Armandinho, soul singer Sandrá Sá, heart-throb reggae and movie star Tony Garrido, and the ever-hip septuagenarian samba singer Elsa Soares. Daniela Mercury once again confirmed her supremacy during carnival, leading the Ecotrio, sponsored by Onda Azul, a non-profit environmental group founded by Gilberto Gil in the early 1990s. Throughout the five days of carnival, Daniela frequently addressed her fans on the Barra-Ondina parade route, extolling the ludic virtues of the pipoca, or "popcorn," the term used in Salvador to refer to revelers who bounce around freely without joining any bloco.
The other major parade route, located downtown from Campo Grande to Praça Castro Alves, was once the privileged space of the Bahian carnival. In the 1980s, it was the site of conflict and tension between the middle-class blocos de trio and the emergent blocos afro of the black working class. With the ascendancy of the Barra-Ondina route, many of the wealthiest and most popular trios simply left the downtown parade route. In carnival 2003 many camarotes constructed around the public square of Campo Grande were left vacant. It almost seemed that the city couldn't give away seats along the parade route, let alone sell them. The Campo Grande-Castro Alves parade route picked up during the latter half of carnival, but it was still clear that it had lost prestige in favor of the beachfront route. However, it continues to be the best place to see the internationally renowned Afro-Brazilian carnival organizations like the Filhos de Gandhy, Ilê Aiyê, Olodum, and Malê, as well as smaller neighborhood groups of lesser fame. axé music, a pop style that emerged in the late 1980s when professional electric bands, like Chiclete com Banana, Banda Eva, Banda Mel, Cheiro de Amor and others picked up on the vibrant hybrid rhythms like samba-reggae first developed by the blocos afro. By the early 1990s, axé music reigned supreme as even some of the blocos afro like Araketu transformed into pop bands in a bid for part of the market share. By the late 1990s axé music was competing with pagode baiano, a form of pop samba noted for explicit sexual word play and dance steps. By 2003, both of these forms had been largely exhausted or at least had lost center stage.
In some ways the Bahian carnival has recuperated some of the musical vibrancy of the 1970s, when bands on trios elétrico played everything from hard rock to frevo from Pernambuco. Top performers like Margareth Menezes, Daniela Mercury, Ivete Sangalo, and Carlinhos Brown play an extraordinary mix of music, ranging from classics of the Bahian carnival like Caetano Veloso's "Chuva, Suor e Cerveja" [Rain, sweat, and beer]-- invariably played during a end-of-summer shower-- to contemporary pop hits like "Já sei namorar" from the blockbuster record Tribalistas featuring Carlinhos Brown, Arnaldo Antunes, and Marisa Monte, three great composer-performers of an artistic generation that came of age in the 1990s. It seemed like every band had to play the song at least once during their parade trajectory. São Paulo native Arnaldo Antunes, with his croaking bass voice and spiky hair cut, became a local celebrity this year even though his style is so at odds with the dominant aesthetic of the Bahian carnival.
Margareth Menezes was also back with lots of energy and brilliance. For the second year in a row, she captivated Bahian carnival with Carlinhos Brown's song "Dandalunda," which was elected the best song of carnival. With her group Os Mascarados, she has also helped to revive the tradition of masking and personalized costumes that had been lost with the growth of the professional blocos de trio, which provide uniform outfits called abadás for their clients, since the 1970s. Her bloco is a favorite among local artists, intellectuals, and professionals, especially among Bahia's large gay community. In the post-carnival awards Dodô e Osmar awards ceremony, named for the two inventors of the trio elétrico, Margareth Menezes was elected best female vocalist of carnival.
The carnival model based on the blocos de trio seems to be in crisis and axé music no longer reigns supreme. But the Bahian carnival continues to reinvent itself, generating new musical adventures, dance styles, and visual aesthetics, making it the most mutable and innovative carnival in the world.
Christopher Dunn. Author of Brutality Garden: Tropicália and the Emergence of a Brazilian Counterculture (University of North Carolina Press, 2001)
Contributed by: Christopher Dunn
|
