Mestre Traíra et Cobrinha Verde — LP

About 1963, movie actor Roberto Batalin produced a capoeira music record featuring masters Traíra, Gato and Cobrinha Verde. A while afterwards, the same LP sold under the title Capoeira da Bahia, mestre Traíra. A CD edition appeared which is easily found. To join the recordings, which are, in our opinion, among the best capoeira music recordings ever commercially published, we post the information, text and photos which the first edition featured, and were dropped afterwards.

Production

In 1960, the play Pagador de promessa (Keeper of Promisses), by Dias Gomes, enjoyed a great and deserved success. The play features the game of capoeira as an icon of popular culture which the plot opposes to the uncompassionate rigor of the Catholic hierarchy. Capoeiristas also take part in the dramatic action. After its adaptation for the screen earned the Palme d’Or in Cannes in May 1962, hundreds of thousands of moviegoers saw the capoeira game scene on the stairs of the Passo church in Salvador in Anselmo Duarte’s film. This opened an opportunity for those who liked capoeira to make it better known.

About that time, actor Roberto Batalin recorded mestre Traíra’s capoeira, reinforced by the participation of Gato, already established as a prominent berimbau player, and famous master Cobrinha Verde as a guest. With the help of fellow artists, Augusto Rodrigues, Caribé, Salomão Scliar, Marcel Gautherot, José Medeiros, and Dias Gomes, who wrote an introductory text, Roberto Batalin produced a LP with a 16-page album illustrated with photos and artwork, at Xauã’s in Rio de Janeiro. It was this firm’s second Brazilian folklore record.

Either because the first edition was limited in number, or because after the military coup of April 1964 and the interdiction of his plays, Dias Gomes’s name was no more fit to sell records, Xauã printed a new, much simpler cover for the same LP. As Mestre Bimba, in the same years, had recorded his Curso de Capoeira Regional LP, at J.S. Discos’ in Bahia, it was useful to mention the origin of Batalin’s recording, stating Capoeira da Bahia – Mestre Traíra. This second edition ended better known than the first.

Text by Dias Gomes

First page of the album.

The English version of Dias Gomes’ text appears on the fifth page of the album.

I did not like the translation, so I wrote it over; but you’ll be free to prefer the original text. The first letter of each paragraph below is a hypertext link to the Portuguese original. Whenever in doubt, we left a comment in subtext — test it just leaving the cursor rest over the quoted word or here.

Original (extracts)

CAPOEIRA is a ballet dancer’s fight. Dance of gladiators. Duel between fellow men. It’s a game, a dance, a quarrel – symbiosis of force and rythm, poetry and agility. Unique in that music and singing command the movements. Submission of force to rythm. Of violence to melody. Sublimation of antagonisms.

In Capoeira, the contenders are not adversaries, they are “comrades”. They don’t fight, they pretend to. They purpose – brilliantly – to deliver an artistic vision of a fight. Above their competitive spirit looms a sense of beauty. The capoeirista is an artist and an athlete, a player and a poet.

We need to know, though, the true CAPOEIRA, that still practised in Bahia, from that which made “malandros” and trouble-makers famous, in the beginning of our [20th] century in Rio and Recife. In these cities, capoeira really meant street turmoil with knives and razor blades besides its characteristic blows. It caused panic in popular festivals and rightful police intervention. Even in Bahia, at that time, the upheaval that capoeiras caused worried the provincial government. To rid itself of them, it sent them to the battlegrounds in Paraguay. Now the rasteira, the au, the meia lua and the rabo de arraia were used as war weapons. With success if we judge by the historical facts.

But Capoeira is only roaming (vadiação) as the bahians players say. They play it in the festivals of Senhor do Bonfim and of Our Lady of the Conception churches; that is where the “mestres” (masters) show off, continuing the glory of legendary Manganga and Samuel God’s Beloved.

THE ART OF CAPOEIRA HAS NINE DIFFERENT MODALITIES, distinct by their music and the way of playing:

CAPOEIRA DE ANGOLA
ANGOLINHA
SÃO BENTO GRANDE
SÃO BENTO PEQUENO
JOGO DE DENTRO
JOGO DE FORA
SANTA MARIA
CONCEIÇÃO DA PRAIA
ASSALVA SINHÔ DO BONFIM

The most played – and the richest in choreography too – is the first. There is also Master Bimba’s “capoeira regional” which incorporates parts of jiu-jitsu, box and catch, rightly rejected by the purists of the art.

In Capoeira de Angola a ritual precedes the fight. The “comrades” set in a semi-circle begin to sing to the sound of berimbaus, pandeiros and chocalhos. That is the precept. Two capoeiristas squat in front of the musicians in a respectful silence. They concentrate and, according to the popular belief, they wait for the saint. The verses of the precept change, but it always ends the same:

Eh, vorta do mundo
camarado!

Eh, around the world
comrade!

That is the cue. Turning the body upon the hands, the capoeiristas go through the circle and begin the fight-dance which choreography the pace of the music rules. The master calls themes in varying rhythm, the chorus repeats, the music never stops, though the songs change. The first are generally mournful – and the fight starts in slow-motion – with large blows where the capoeiristas display their perfect muscular control. Soon the berimbau beat pattern changes and the pace speeds up – the players change their game and the legs begin to cut the air with incredible agility. The audience stirs the contenders: – Lemme see a “skatetail” master Coca! – What a cartwheel, boy! – C’mon, comrade, leave that “but-but”, flog him!

And the usual corpse-smeller says gloomily: – I’d like to see that for real.

Capoeira is a toy (brinquedo), so many blows are forbidden, like those which might hurt eyes, ears, kidneys, stomach, etc.

But if the fight is for real (a vera), then anything goes…

The most prominent blows are:

THE BALOON – the capoeirista embraces the opponent’s body with both arms, and throws him backwards over his head.
THE RASTEIRA – one sweeps with one of the legs trying to hit the opponent’s feet and move him.
THE SKATE’S TAIL – with both hands on the ground, the capoeirista moves his stretched legs in semi-circle, trying to reach his fellow.
THE WHIP – the foot fall from above at an angle of 45 degrees.
THE AU – a somersault, basing the body on the hands and throwing both feet ahead.

The BANANA TREE, the HALF-MOON and the FOOT-PLATE are variants of the WHIP.

There are also the Cabeçada, the Golpe de Pescoço, the Dedo nos Olhos, and many other blows or steps to this strange and manly ballet brought by the Bantu slaves from Angola with their barbaric and mighty culture.

Capoeira as played today in Bahia may owe very little to its land of origin. This record presents lyrics and melodies that let us feel the spirit of our people, its ability to assimilate and create over again. Indeed the very transformation of a fight into a dance, of a conflict into a reason for singing and dancing is very much like our folk…

Capoeira is an authentic expression of our people’s character, spirit and genius. With capoeira, we Brazilian tell the world:

Wouldn’t it be good if any conflict, any dispute, however violent, could be settled with music and poetry?

DIAS GOMES

Middle pages of the album. Reproduction of a painting by Augusto Rodrigues.

Credits

Credits compiled from pages 2 and 14 of the album and from the disc labels.

Master: Traíra (João Ramos do Nascimento)
Side A track 2: Cobrinha Verde (Rafael Alves França)
Berimbau: Gato (José Gabriel Góes); Chumba (Reginaldo Paiva); De Guinê (Vivaldo Sacramento)
Pandeiro: Pai-de-Família (Flaviano Xavier); Quebra-Jumelo (Vanildo Cardoso de Souza)
Singing: Didi (Djalma da Conceição Ferreira)
Production: Roberto Batalin
Photos: Salomão Scliar; Marcel Gautherot
Text: Dias Gomes
Art: Augusto Rodrigues; Caribé
Page setting: José Medeiros (image)
General coordination: Editora Xauã, Pça Mahatma Gandhi 2 5.910, Telefone 43-300 Guanabara Brasil
Printing: Artes Graficas Palmeiras, Rua Barão de Itapagipe 60, Guanabara - Brasil
Manufacturing: Cia. Industrial de Discos, Rua 29 de Julho, 169, Rio de Janeiro - Brasil

Last page of the album. Drawings by Caribé.

A few comments

by Pol Briand

A view on capoeira

We may feel the range of different points of view on capoeira of people able to organize the recording, editing and publishing of a commercial musical record, when we compare this record with the other two sold at the same time. Musician and recording engineer Jorge Santos recorded Mestre Bimba’s Curso de Capoeira Regional about 1962 in his studio in uptown Salvador; Camafeu de Oxossi’s Berimbaus de Bahia was produced in the Bahian studios of the main broadcast operator, Radio Sociedade, issued about 1966 and later reissued and distributed in Europe.

Music in Capoeira Course confirms the didactical intention expressed by its title, with strongly accentuated rhythms and an unchallenged domination of the master and his berimbau. The recording studio esthetics also expresses itself in the production as a longing for a kind of technical perfection, and good musical ideas, like the accent given to the excellent female chorus. A number of recordings of master Bimba’s music captured in other circumstances give us the opportunity to know what is constant in it, like the master’s position, from what is special to the commercial recording.
Camafeu’s LP, to which best-selling author Jorge Amado contributed an introductive text, reflects the same media professional esthetics, combined to a clear imposition of cultural values. In comparison with other capoeira recordings, including unpublished tapes and discs, the interpretation of songs regularises the lyrics metrics, which was the object of the disdain of scholarly commenters (Almeida 1941, Oliveira 1956) and avoids rhythmic variations. That is folklore which wishes not to hurt the delicate ears of tourists, and does not care to challenge prejudice about popular culture. Rhythm is simple and equal all the time, the singer has what radio professionals call a good voice: the same that is heard daily. In fact, this recording is not quite interesting.
Contrasting with both, the record built around the capoeira masters Traíra and Cobrinha Verde was recorded off studio. Along with the disc side by Waldemar da Paixão published in Paris (Dreyfus 1955), which does not seem to have been known in Brazil, this LP offers a much less constrained account of what one could hear in capoeira circles. It features, all along, rhythmic dialogue between berimbaus. The editor leaved a distinct cut and a little ambient sound, in a counterpart to the neo-realistic esthetics of the best Brazilian films of the time. And the musicians use subtle musical techniques to yield a dancing energy which has no common measure with that of the record produced in the main Bahian broadcaster’s studio, with music played at the same tempo.

The first edition, with its album of photographs and art work, aimed at an audience disposed to pay a little more to reward an artistic achievement. The complete lack of people related to the music recording industry among the contributors, and the accumulation of names reputed in the graphical arts and the movies, between whom one easily finds archives of work relationships, indicates well enough the origin of this production.

The translation of the text into English and French expresses the desire, indeed a little vague, for the production did not take care to get good translations, to promote Brazilian popular culture outside the country, within the area of interest of the organizers: Cannes, Hollywood – as denotes the lack of Spanish and German texts. An overview of the biographies of the people involved yields the notion of a cluster of both modernistic and nationalistic intelectuals, dedicated to an artistic creating process for which the doers define their own criteria of quality.

We cannot accept a description which sets entirely aside violence in the capoeira game, and the ever-important dodges and evasions among its moves. This is the mark of an external vision, quite that of an author who left Bahia aged thirteen, and who belonged to a class quite apart from that of the illiterate, hand-working capoeiristas. But we do appreciate and support his attempt to have capoeira considered, neither as a sport in the modern sense, olympic, competitive, submitted to explicit regulations and state-sponsored, neither as a simple folkloric entertainment for tourists, but as a full-blown artistic activity defining internally and informally its own hierarchies.

Last updated March 27, 2007.

The teaching of capoeiristas

It would be useless and offensive to point out all in the doing and saying of the masters recorded here, that contradicts more recent definitive affirmations by known capoeiristas and reputed observers. We have endeavoured to produce an objective description, selecting basic criteria to compare productions of diverse times, places and people. We direct our main effort to the gathering and training of a group that will be able to play music in this style, hoping to access by this way a capoeira playing style.

We feel wary enough of writing down our interpretation of this record in the light of our experience in other times and places. We fear that making explicit whatever has lit up in the corner of our eye, our discourse might mislead our readers into thinking that our sayings are true, independantly of their own situation. Except in poetry, written statements have a definite and definitive meaning, and intervene sequencially; but in life, as in capoeira as a game, these fundamentos all act together at the same time. They are each like a web of strings, more or less elastic, more or less tense, that link families of objects, of situations, of constraints. None of these webs, of these force fields, has a single influence over decisions that must be made. This fundamental difference between the quiet linearity of philosophy and the turbulent dialectics of action makes us extremely wary whenever the goal would be to pass something of our very weak wisdom through impersonal discourse.

There is one simple fact that we do dare to affirm. One does not play capoeira and its music by oneself. Both are played by two plus a number. In the game, one reacts to attack by dodging, to menace by moving, to challenge by mockery, and to any intervention of the other by the invention of the moment, hoping that a convenient decision will make one able to affirm a superiority. And one should react to music, too, which expresses the will of that number waiting to enter the roda. The music that we play for this game does not merely accompany it, but takes part to it and strengthens it, when each participant reacts to another to whom he responds and who responds to him; the flexible intercourse of these twosome links sets the band together, not their submission to a common abstract overarching time rule.

In a way, capoeiristas are hardly doing anything else at any time than adjusting their hierarchies. Who shows superiority while keeping in time with the music, makes show of a dominance approved by all. Were it or not the wish or the will of the very musicians, it becomes their view. This happens easily if the percussion orchestra, by a discreet, but timely intervention, orients the game; which occurs on the condition that musical actions answer game actions within the roda closely enough for the accent of a musical cycle to coincide with that of a movement.

Same as what it needs to apply a rasteira, it is a matter of an action withheld until the exact moment when it must happen. The intercourse between players and musicians is two-way. The players follow the music, and the musicians, the player’s steps.

The master’s task is to guide the players, indicating the style that he would like to see from them, and setting the pace, not like a military officer gives orders, but more like the hand may roll, without much strain, a heavy wheel, by a measured impulse which speeds it up if it slacks and restraints it if it is too fast, or like a rider directs his horse. Musicians should react to one another. A berimbau may skip one or two strikes, so that the other will complete the toque in his own way; it leaves a silence around a pandeiro strike to set the marcação out; it lowers its voice, asking for an answer, in the form of a variation, from the other berimbau. The chorus responds to the leader, shouts in appreciation of a moment of the game. That is when discourse withers and fades: for between the musical actions, all the turbulent dialectics of interactions which we mentioned about individual decisions is at work.

We may now hint at how a music style can relate to a game style. To keep the capoeiristas in tune with the pace and style required or proposed by the music, the basic, characteristic strike pattern of the toque must sound frequently enough, and the pace marking drum (marcação) must soar clearly. The instruments can’t dive into endless and complex variations all at a time. Typically, one berimbau plays its basic toque while the other produces a variation; then it will answer this variation with another, when its partner has fallen back into its own basic toque. Variations that suppress or shift strikes are more efficient, in that they do not cancel the other’s part. Singing or handclapping should not be so loud as to cover the berimbaus. The players likewise cannot engage in long bouts of acrobatic or fight movements which give the percussionists no timing clue. Their ginga is to them what the basic toque is to the instruments in the orchestra. Their movements, like the hand on a drum, slap and rest, they do not flow rhythmlessly. That is their part of the relationship to the music.

We perceive in modern capoeira an excess of attack and a lack of dodging; in its music, an excess of action and a lack of silence. Listening to the instruments, we wonder whether everyone wants to play the whole toque alone, as if one felt no interest at all in reacting to the other. The result nears mechanical, hypnotic regularity, with whimsical variations unrelated to each other.

We have been wondering whether literacy, the pressure of the mass media, individualist education, and all the facts of life in the present era, would free people from the desire of interacting with fellow humans, or if conversely, the practice of capoeira in the style that we have briefly outlined, could offer a way to develop the abilities, maimed by the same social structures, to fulfill this desire of interaction understood as a fundamental human need. As said poet Octavio Paz, “rhythm is a world vision”.

That is to say how much we value the present record.

March 27, 2007.

Bibliographic and discographic References

Almeida, Renato, “O Brinquedo da Capoeira”, Tablado Folclórico, São Paulo: Record, 1961, pp. 125-136. 1ª ed. Revista do Arquivo Municipal de S. Paulo, vol LXXXIV, pp. 157-162, 1941.
Bimba, Manoel dos Reis Machado, Mestre, Curso de Capoeira Regional, Salvador, J. S. Discos, JLP-101, c. 1963, disque 33t.
Camafeu de Oxossi (Apio Patrocínio da Conceição), Capoeira, Rio de Janeiro: Continental, s.d., disque 33t; enregistrée dans les studios de Radio Sociedade à Bahia.
Dreyfus, Simone (collectrice) Brésil vol.2, Paris: Musée de l’Homme, 1956; face 1, Capoeira (Waldemar Rodrigues da Paixão, 30 oct. 1955), disque 33t.
Oliveira, Albano Marinho de, “Berimbau, o arco musical da capoeira”, Revista do Instituto Geográfico Histórico da Bahia, n°80, Salvador: IGHBa, 1956, pp.229-264.
Paz, Octavio, “El ritmo”, El arco y la lira, 1956.

Annexes

Music

Summary of the contents of the 7 tracks. Except when “quoted”, the designation of berimbau toques is ours. The identification of the lead singer is that which the disc label mentions. Please read our definition of descriptive terms chula, corrido, etc.

9:07 — Santa Maria — Lead: Traíra.
- [Toque: Angola =80]
  - Chula: 28 verses with instrumental parts “Eu ’tava em casa”. In F. see notes
  - Canto de entrada 6 lines
- [Toque São Bento Grande =92]
  - Corrido “Santa Maria”. 8 call of same lines and chorus answers.
  - instrumental =100
- Iê final.
5:31 — São Bento Pequeno — Lead: Cobrinha Verde.
- [Toque Angola =72]
  - Chula: 11 verses “Menino que vende aí?”. In F#
  - Canto de entrada 14 first lines …
- [Toque Santa Maria]
  - … end of Canto de entrada, 3 lines.
  - Corrido “Santo Antônio é protetor” varying call lines [pacing up]
  - instrumental =104.
- Iê and final whistle.
5:21 — São Bento Grande — Lead: Traíra. with some ambient sound.
- [Toque Angola =74]
  - Chula: 10 verses, the first repeated “Quando morrer não quero grito no enterro”
  - Corrido chorus — “Cordão de Ouro”. In F#. two calling lines … for 19 rounds. =82
- berimbau call: Corrido “Dona Maria do Camboatá” …
- [Toque de São Bento Grande]
  - cont. of corrido “Dona Maria do Camboatá” a total of 26 rounds of same lines.
  - instrumental =90
- [Variating Toques], instrumental.
- Iê and final whistle.
6:34 — Jogo de Dentro — Lead: Traíra.
- [Toque Angola =80]
  - Chula 40 verses with instrumental parts “Riachão ’tava cantando”. In G. see notes.
  - Canto de entrada 9 lines =88
- Short berimbau call
- [Toque São Bento Grande =94]
  - short instrumental
  - Corrido “Parana é”, 8 different call lines for 12 call and response rounds.
  - instrumental.
- Iê and final whistle.
5:10 — Cavalaria — Lead: Traíra
- [Toque Cavalaria] instrumental =90→100
- Berimbau call: Corrido “Ponha laranja no chão tico-tico” (in F#, lead tiles over the chorus) …
- [Toque de Angola solta] cont. of corrido “Ponha laranja no chão tico-tico”
- [Toque de São Bento Grande] cont. of corrido “Ponha laranja no chão tico-tico” a total of 43 call and response rounds with two different call lines. =104
- Final whistle.
1:38 — Iuna — with some ambient sound.
- [Toque Iúna] Instrumental: two berimbaus, no marcação, short pandeiro inputs.
7:36 — Sequência de ritmos
- Instrumental: Varied Toques with announcements.
- “Angola Pequena” =74
- “Angola” =80
- “Angola Dobrada” >=88
- “Santa Maria” =88
- “Regional” =94
- “Cavalaria” =98
- “Jôgo de Dentro” =96
- “Guarani” =96
- “Gêge” =98
- “Kêtu” =98
- final whistle

Total time: 40:45

Terms

We use popular musical descriptive term in an unaccustomated strict, rigorous sense. This is only for convenience, in order to shorten the description of the musical events in the recordings, and we do not intend to impose these meanings on anyone.

Chula
Solo singing of more than four verses, without chorus response. The first piece of a complete capoeira sequence. When it lasts, that is, nearly always in present use, it is called a ladainha (litany). This difference is of no use in this work, since our goal is to describe the musical form, and we indicate the actual number of lines sung. There is no game generally during the chula.
Corrido
The soloist, called puxador or tirador sings an improvised call, one or two lines long, which the chorus responds to always by the same line. Sung while capoeiristas dance/fight. The soloist may prefer rhythmic variations over a single line.
Canto de entrada (entrance song)
The soloist sings four-feet calls which the chorus repeats, adding the word “camará” (comrade). Always after a chula and before a corrido. Generally the game begins when this song ends.
Pace
We write the approximate tempo in the european music school notation. Two quarters make up a basic berimbau toque cycle. When we heard no clear marcação sound, we decided that the pace concept was unfit.

The terms chula and corrido are found in samba de roda context, with the same meaning, including about dance. The term marcação is also common in Brazilian folk music.

Translation as on fourth page of the album (extract)

CAPOEIRA is a ballet dancer’s fight. Dance of gladiators. Duel between fellow men. It’s a game, a dance, a dispute – harmony of force and rythm, poetry and agility. Unique in the movement comanded by music and singing. The submission of force to rythm. From violence to melody. The sublimation of antagonisms.

In Capoeira, the fighters are not adversaries, they are “comrades”. They don’t fight, they just pretend to. They search most in geniusly for a way to give an artistic vision of a combat. Besides the competitive spirit they have a sense of beauty. The capoeira man is an artist and an athlete, a player and a poet.

However, we must distinguish the true CAPOEIRA, as that still practised in Bahia, from the one which marked the “malandro” and disorders in the beginning of our century in Rio and Recife. In these cities, the Capoeira was really a street fight including knife and razor blades besides their characteristic strikes. It caused panic in popular feasts and almost always provoked police intervention. Even in Bahia, at that time, the capoeiras worried the province authorities by the disturbances they caused. To banish them, the government sent them to fight in Paraguay. And for the first time the rasteira, the au, the meia lua and the rabo de arraia were used as war weapons. With success if we judge the historical facts.

But the Capoeira is just a vadiação – as the bahians call it, practiced nowdays in the glorification feasts of Senhor do Bonfim and Our Lady of the Beach Conception, where the “mestres” (masters) exibhit the selves continuing the glory of Manganga and Samuel God’s beloved, legendary capoeiras. We find Nine different Modalities of the Capoeiras Art, distinguished basically by the music and the way of playing it:

CAPOEIRA DE ANGOLA
ANGOLINHA
SÃO BENTO GRANDE
SÃO BENTO PEQUENO
JOGO DE DENTRO
JOGO DE FORA
SANTA MARIA
CONCEIÇÃO DA PRAIA
ASSALVA SINHÔ DO BONFIM

The most practised – and also the richest in terms of choreography – is the first one.

We have the “regionalistic capoeira” or “regionalistic bahian fight” of Master Bimba with inserts of jiu-jitsu, box and catch as catch can, justly refused by the purists of the art.

In Capoeira de Angola a ritual preceeds the fight disposed in a semi-circle, the “comrades” start the singing under the berimbaus tunes pandeiros and chocalhos. Crouched before the musicians the two players are still in a respectful silence. That is the presept. The capoeiras men concentrate themselves and according to the popular belief they wait for the saint. The verses of the precept vary. But the lasts are always the same:

Eh, vorta do mundo
camarado!

Eh, come back to the world
comrade!

That is the signal. Turning the body upon the hands, the capoeiras go through the circle, initiating the fight-and-dance whose choreography is dictated by the musical rythm. The music is never interrupted varying the tunes played by the master and repeated by the chorus. The first melodies are generally dolent – and the fight starts in slow-motion – with large strikes wher the capoeiras display their perfect muscular control. Soon the berimbau beat changes and the rythm accelerates – the players change their game and the legs start cutting the air with incredible agility. The assistance stimulates the contendors – I wanna see a ‘skatetail’ Master Coca –Boy what an ‘au’ – Hurry up my comrade leave this ‘but-but’ and use a ‘whip’ on him. And there is always a defunct smeller saying gloomily – I would like to see it for life or death.

Capoeira is a toy. So many strikes are forbidden like those which could hurt the eyes, hears, kidneys, stomarch, etc.

But when they really mean it everything goes in the stream …

The most prominent strikes are:

THE BALOON — with both arms, the capoeiras entangles the adversary’s body and throws him upon his head backwards.
THE RASTEIRA — one scrapes with one of the legs trying to hit the opponent"s feet and throw him down.
THE SKATES TAIL — with both hands on the ground, the capoeira man makes a semi-circle with hid stretched legs, trying as in the rasteira to take out the other fighter’s base.
THE WHIP — the foot comes from up above in an up-side-down jump completing an angle of 45 degrees.
THE AU — a break neck leap, basing the body on the hands and throwing both feet ahead.

The Banana Tree. The Middle Moon and the Flat Foot are the Whip’s variations. There are still the Cabeça, Golpe de Pescoço, Dedo nos Olhos and many other strikes or steps of this strange and viril ballet brought by the Bantu Slaves from Angola among their barbarian and powerful culture.

It’s possible that Capoeira as practiced today in Bahia owes very little to it’s country of origin. In the verses and music recorded in the present long playing, we feel the presence of our people in his capacity of assimilation and recreation. And the own transformation of a fight in a dance, of a conflict in a motiv for singing is very much for our people.

With this, we enable ourselves to send everywhere in the world the following message:

How good it could be, if every conflict, every dispute could be cleared up with music and poetry.

Sundry information

What Pagador de Promessa (Keeper of Promisses) is about

A play by Dias Gomes, 1960.

A simple peasant, Donkey Jo, followed by his wife, arrives in front of a church in Salvador, carrying a heavy wooden cross which he intends to leave below the altar of Saint Barbara to keep a promise that he made in an emergency. The priest, who approves not of “superstition”, leaves him waiting outside of the church; more so, when he hears Jo’s explanations, which mix candomblé (the popular African-originated cult) to catholicism, and he learns that the motive of the promise is the well-being of an animal, Jo’s donkey. Resolute in his determination to keep his promise, the man waits on the stairs of the church. Passers-by gather…

Ladainhas

In his comunication on berimbau to his colleagues of the Instituto Geográfico Histórico da Bahia in 1956, Albano Marinho de Oliveira notes:

Presentemente, porém, vêm sendo criados temas, quasi sempre longos, de pouco efeito melódico, uma vez que o mestre de capoeira demora-se entoando os numerosos versos de extenso solo, versos sem métrica, nem rima e quasi sem o acompanhamento coral do grupo de tocadores.

Presently, though, themes are created, nearly always long, of little melodic effect, since the capoeira master belates himself singing many lines in an extended solo, meterless and rhymeless verses with almost no chorus from the music-playing group.

The author took his information from capoeira masters Waldemar and Bimba. I know of no long “theme” sung by the creator of Capoeira Regional. As a matter of fact, in Lorenzo Turner’s recordings, dating from late 1940, all chulas, whoever the group, are four to ten lines long; in Anthony Leeds’, taped at Waldemar’s in 1950, there is a ladainha more than seven minutes long, a particular version in 144 seven-feet redondilha maior verses, of the story of the Valiant Vilela, broadly printed in the literatura de cordel booklets. The introduction of long chulas seem to relate to the Sunday practice of the capoeira game, in a way that we deem quieter than at the time of police repression. Waiting endlessly, squatting before the instruments, for the cue to go and play, could make the capoeiristas call such long songs, mockingly, litanies.

Two of the three chulas that Traíra, a close associate to Waldemar, sings, may leave the players waiting long enough to deserve being called litanies, with 28 lines in two minutes and 40 lines in two minutes and a half. His other two titles do not fall in the common capoeira sequence, chula, canto de entrada, corrido(s). Cobrinha Verde’s contribution conforms to this canon, with a short chula, as in the 1940 recordings.

Riachão

More than to any existing singer, this song refers to the famous Desafio de Riachão e do Diabo (Challenge of Riachão and the Devil), an elaborate rendering of a poets improvising challenge, of which exist a quantity of versions in Northeastern Brazil literatura de cordel peddler’s booklets, and which many capoeira singers refer occasionally to.

The literatura de cordel is a vast repository of seven-feet verses which can often, not always, depending, I think, on the poet, fit to the capoeira song rythm.

People (selected)

We will welcome warmly any information about people mentioned on this page, particularily about those about whom we know nothing. Photographs from the time will be much apreciated. Authors and contributors will be duly credited.

Cobrinha Verde — Rafael Alves França (“Cobrinha Verde”) (Santo Amaro, BA c. 1910 – Salvador, 1983). One of the most famous capoeira masters in the 1950’s and 1960’s. He had learned capoeira with his famous cousin Besouro Mangangá (killed 1927). Toward the end of his life, he declared that he kept the promise made to his master and cousin never to earn money with capoeira.
Traíra — João Ramos do Nascimento (Cachoeira BA 1920? – Salvador c. 1970). Famous capoeirista of Liberdade, associated to Mestre Waldemar da Paixão.
Gato — José Gabriel Goes (Santo Amaro, BA, 1929 – Salvador, 2002). Capoeira master and known berimbau player; participated in the Brazilian delegation to the Festival des Arts Nègres in Dakar, 1966. Recorded a CD in 2000, Mestre Gato Preto, L’art du berimbau.
Roberto Batalin — Brazilian actor (4 sep. 1926 – before 2004). Appears in many movies and owned a recording studio for film work in Rio.
Dias Gomes — Alfredo de Freitas Dias Gomes, Brazilian playwright and screenplay writer (Salvador, 1922 – São Paulo, 1999). Author of Pagador de Promessa.
Caribé — Hector Júlio Paride Bernabó, painter and draughtsman (Lanús, Argentine, 1911 — Salvador Bahia, 1997).
Augusto Rodrigues — Brazilian painter, draughtsman, caricaturist and teacher (Recife, PE, 1913 – Resende, RJ 1993).
Marcel Gautherot — French photographer (Paris, 1910 – Rio de Janeiro, 1996).
José Medeiros — Brazilian photographer (Teresina, PI, 1921 – Aquila, Italie 1990).
Salomão Scliar — Brazilian photographer and film director (Porto Alegre, 1925 – idem, 1991).
Anselmo Duarte — Brazilian actor and film director (Salto (SP), 1920 – ). Director linked to the film adaptation of Pagador de Promessa.

The spirit of the times

A world in conflict

The Cold War goes on with menace of nuclear weapons escalating in power and number; limited or local conflicts fuel the fear of war between blocks: China and Russia, China and India, USA and Cuba, growing US implication in Viet-Nam…
From 1958 to 1962 the French and British empires in Africa crumble, but civil strife challenges newly independant states.
In Brazil, a nationalist wing clashes with another, self-dubbed “democratic”, though it will organize and support the military coup of 1964.

A few dates

April 21, 1960 — Brazilian capital transferred to brand-new Brasília. The Federal District of Rio de Janeiro becomes the Guanabara State.
May 1, 1960 — US spy plane U2 shot down over USSR.
July 29, 1960 — Theatrical debut of Pagador de Promessa by Dias Gomes.
January 3, 1961 — USA break diplomatic ties with Cuba.
April 12, 1961 — Russian cosmonaut Gagarin orbits Earth.
May 1962 — Pagador de Promessa earns the Palme d’Or in Cannes.
June 16, 1962 — Brazil wins World Cup in Chile.
March 30, 1964 — Military coup overthrows Brazilian President João Goulart.
1964 — Salvador’s Municipal Tourism agency publishes Capoeira Angola, by Mestre Pastinha.

(Several other timeline entries and contextual notes appear in the original album and liner notes.)

Notes on sources and acknowledgements

Bibliographic and discographic references used in the compilation include works by Almeida, Bimba, Camafeu de Oxossi, Dreyfus, Oliveira and Paz, among others. Credits and personnel are drawn from the LP album pages and disc labels.